[Fromkin v., Rodman R., Hyams N.] an Introduction

Part of the Tongue Involved

Tongue

HeightFRONT CENTRAL BACK

HIGH u boot

ROUNDED ʊ put

MID o boat

ǝ about

ᴧ butt

LOW

i beet

ɪ bit

e bait

ɛ bet

æ bat a balm ɔ bawd

Classification of American English Vowels

Consonants Vowels

pill till kill beet bit

bill dill gill bait bet

mill nil ring boot foot

feel seal heal boat bore

veal zeal leaf bat pot/bar

thigh chill reef butt sofa

thy gin you bite bout

shill which witch boy

measure

A Phonetic Alphabet for English Pronunciation

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V I C T O R I A F R O M K I N

Late, University of California, Los Angeles

R O B E R T R O D M A N

North Carolina State University, Raleigh

N I N A H YA M S

University of California, Los Angeles

An Introduction to Language 10e

Australia • Brazil • Japan • Korea • Mexico • Singapore • Spain • United Kingdom • United States



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An Introduction to Language,

Tenth Edition

Victoria Fromkin, Robert Rodman, and

Nina Hyams

Publisher: Michael Rosenberg

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In memory of Simon Katz and Lauren Erickson





v

CHAPTER 1

What Is Language? 1

Linguistic Knowledge 1

3

3

What Is Grammar? 9

What Is Not (Human) Language 16

Language and Thought 21

Summary 25

References for Further Reading 27

Exercises 28

Preface xi

About the Authors ix

Contents

CHAPTER 2

Morphology: The Words of Language 33

Content Words and Function Words 35

Morphemes: The Minimal

Units of Meaning 36

42

43

Rules of Word Formation 43

44

46

49

52

54

55

56

56

57

60

Sign Language Morphology 60

Morphological Analysis: Identifying

Morphemes 61

Summary 65


Exercises 66



vi CONTENTS

Lexical Semantics (Word Meanings) 152

153

154

155

155

158

159

159

162

163

Pragmatics 165

166

167

168

170

171

174

174

Summary 175


Exercises 178

CHAPTER 5

Phonetics: The Sounds of Language 189

Sound Segments 190

191

192

Articulatory Phonetics 194

195

195

197

203

205

205

207

207

208

208

Major Phonetic Classes 208

209

CHAPTER 3

Syntax: The Sentence Patterns of Language 76

What the Syntax Rules Do 77

80

Sentence Structure 81

82

84

87

95

100

104

105

107

109

111

UG Principles and Parameters 114

Sign Language Syntax 117

Appendix A 119

Appendix B 121

Appendix C 127

Summary 128


Exercises 129

CHAPTER 4

The Meaning of Language 139

What Speakers Know

about Sentence Meaning 140

140

141

142

Compositional Semantics 143

144

145

146

When Compositionality Goes Awry 147

147

149

150



CONTENTS vii

251

Prosodic Phonology 252

252

253

254

255

Sequential Constraints of Phonemes 256

257

Why Do Phonological Rules Exist? 258

259

Phonological Analysis 260

Summary 264


Exercises 266

CHAPTER 7

Language in Society 279

Dialects 279

281

283

284

284

285

287

288

291

295

297

300

Languages in Contact 301

301

302

306

309

310

Language and Education 312

312

313

315

316

318

209

209

210

Prosodic Features 210

211

Phonetic Symbols and Spelling

Correspondences 213

The “Phonetics” of Signed Languages 215

Summary 216


Exercises 218

CHAPTER 6

Phonology: The Sound Patterns of Language 224

The Pronunciation of Morphemes 225

225

228

Phonemes: The Phonological Units

of Language 230

230

232

233

235

Distinctive Features of Phonemes 235

236

237

238

239

241

The Rules of Phonology 241

243

243

245

247

249

250



viii CONTENTS

365

369

Extinct and Endangered Languages 371

The Genetic Classification of Languages 374

375

Types of Languages 378

Why Do Languages Change? 381

Summary 384


Exercises 386

CHAPTER 9

Language Acquisition 394

The Linguistic Capacity of Children 394

395

398

398

400

401

402

404

406

408

411

415

416

419

420

The Role of the Linguistic Environment:

Adult Input 422

422

424

Knowing More Than One Language 425

426

427

428

429

429

430

Language in Use 318

319

319

320

320

322

323

323

324

325

Summary 326


Exercises 329

CHAPTER 8

Language Change: The Syllables of Time 337

The Regularity of Sound Change 338

339

339

Phonological Change 340

341

342

Morphological Change 344

Syntactic Change 345

Lexical Change 350

350

351

351

353

354

355

356

359

360

361

361

361

Reconstructing “Dead” Languages 361

362

363



CONTENTS ix

473

Language and Brain Development 474

475

476

476

The Modular Mind: Dissociations

of Language and Cognition 479

479

481

482

Summary 482


Exercises 487

CHAPTER 11

Computer Processing of Human Language 495

Computers That Talk and Listen 495

496

496

498

502

503

505

507

508

Applications of Computational Linguistics 509

509

510

511

512

513

514

515

516

518

518

519

519

430

432

433

434

434

Summary 436


Exercises 438

CHAPTER 10

Language Processing and the Human Brain 444

The Human Mind at Work 444

445

446

447

449

451

453

456

456

458

458

Brain and Language 461

461

462

463

470

471

471

472

472



x CONTENTS

536

537

Writing and Speech 539

542

544

544

546

Pseudo-writing 547

Summary 548


Exercises 550

Glossary 555

Index 587

Summary 521


Exercises 523

CHAPTER 12

Writing: The ABCs of Language 527

The History of Writing 528

528

529

531

532

Modern Writing Systems 533

534

535



xi

Highlights of This Edition

Preface

Well, this bit which I am writing, called Introduction, is really the er-h’r’m of the book,

and I have put it in, partly so as not to take you by surprise, and partly because I can’t

do without it now. There are some very clever writers who say that it is quite easy not to

have an er-h’r’m, but I don’t agree with them. I think it is much easier not to have all the

rest of the book.

A. A. MILNE, Now We Are Six, 1927

The last thing we find in making a book is to know what we must put first.

BLAISE PASCAL (1623–1662)



xii PREFACE



PREFACE xiii

ɹ



xiv PREFACE



PREFACE xv

Additional Resources



xvi PREFACE

Acknowledgments



PREFACE xvii



xviii PREFACE



xix

VICTORIA FROMKIN

ROBERT RODMAN

NINA HYAMS

About the Authors



xx ABOUT THE AUTHORS



1

When we study human language, we are approaching what some might call the “human

essence,” the distinctive qualities of mind that are, so far as we know, unique to man.

Linguistic Knowledge

Do we know only what we see, or do we see what we somehow already know?

CYNTHIA OZICK, “What Helen Keller Saw,” New Yorker, June 16 & 23, 2003

1What Is Language?

NOAM CHOMSKY, Language and Mind, 1968



2 CHAPTER 1 What Is Language?

Knowledge of the Sound System

When I speak it is in order to be heard.

ROMAN JAKOBSON




Knowledge of Words

Arbitrary Relation of Form and Meaning

The minute I set eyes on an animal I know what it is. I don’t have to reflect a moment; the

right name comes out instantly. I seem to know just by the shape of the creature and

the way it acts what animal it is. When the dodo came along he [Adam] thought it was a

wildcat. But I saved him. I just spoke up in a quite natural way and said, “Well, I do declare

if there isn’t the dodo!”

MARK TWAIN, Eve’s Diary, 1906




HERMAN®/LaughingStock Licensing Inc., Ottawa, Canada




The Creativity of Linguistic Knowledge

All humans are artists, all of us . . . Our greatest masterpiece of art is the use of a language

to create an entire virtual reality within our mind.

DON MIGUEL RUIZ, 2012

Albert: So are you saying that you were the best friend of the woman who was married to

the man who represented your husband in divorce?

André: In the history of speech, that sentence has never been uttered before.

NEIL SIMON, The Dinner Party, 2000







Knowledge of Sentences and Nonsentences

A person who knows a language has mastered a system of rules that assigns sound and

meaning in a definite way for an infinite class of possible sentences.

NOAM CHOMSKY, Language and Mind, 1968




Linguistic Knowledge and Performance

“What’s one and one and one and one and one and one and one and one and one and

one?” “I don’t know,” said Alice. “I lost count.” “She can’t do Addition,” the Red Queen

interrupted.

LEWIS CARROLL, Through the Looking-Glass, 1871



What Is Grammar? 9

What Is Grammar?

We use the term “grammar” with a systematic ambiguity. On the one hand, the term refers

to the explicit theory constructed by the linguist and proposed as a description of the

speaker’s competence. On the other hand, it refers to this competence itself.

NOAM CHOMSKY AND MORRIS HALLE, The Sound Pattern of English, 1968

Descriptive Grammars

There are no primitive languages. The great and abstract ideas of Christianity can be

discussed even by the wretched Greenlanders.

JOHANN PETER SUESSMILCH, in a paper delivered before the Prussian Academy, 1756




Prescriptive Grammars

It is certainly the business of a grammarian to find out, and not to make, the laws of a

language.

JOHN FELL, Essay towards an English Grammar, 1784

Just read the sentence aloud, Amanda, and listen to how it sounds. If the sentence sounds

OK, go with it. If not, rearrange the pieces. Then throw out the rule books and go to bed.

JAMES KILPATRICK, “Writer’s Art” (syndicated newspaper column), 1998

Any fool can make a rule

And every fool will mind it

HENRY DAVID THOREAU, journal entry, 1860



What Is Grammar? 11




Teaching Grammars

I don’t want to talk grammar. I want to talk like a lady.

G. B. SHAW, Pygmalion, 1912



What Is Grammar? 13

Universal Grammar

In a grammar there are parts that pertain to all languages; these components form what is

called the general grammar. In addition to these general (universal) parts, there are those

that belong only to one particular language; and these constitute the particular grammars

of each language.

CÉSAR CHESNEAU DU MARSAIS, c. 1750




The Development of Grammar

How comes it that human beings, whose contacts with the world are brief and personal

and limited, are nevertheless able to know as much as they do know?

BERTRAND RUSSELL, Human Knowledge: Its Scope and Limits, 1948



What Is Grammar? 15

Sign Languages: Evidence for Language Universals

It is not the want of organs that [prevents animals from making] . . . known their

thoughts . . . for it is evident that magpies and parrots are able to utter words just like

ourselves, and yet they cannot speak as we do, that is, so as to give evidence that they

think of what they say. On the other hand, men who, being born deaf and mute . . . are

destitute of the organs which serve the others for talking, are in the habit of themselves

inventing certain signs by which they make themselves understood.

RENÉ DESCARTES, Discourse on Method, 1637




What Is Not (Human) Language

It is a very remarkable fact that there are none so depraved and stupid, without even

excepting idiots, that they cannot arrange different words together, forming of them a

statement by which they make known their thoughts; while, on the other hand, there is

no other animal, however perfect and fortunately circumstanced it may be, which can do

the same.

RENÉ DESCARTES, Discourse on Method and Meditation on First Philosophy

The Birds and the Bees

Teach me half the gladness

That thy brain must know;

Such harmonious madness

From my lips would flow,

The world should listen then, as I am listening now.

PERCY BYSSHE SHELLEY, 1792–1822, To a Skylark




Patrick McDonnell/King Features Syndicate







Can Animals Learn Human Language?

It is a great baboon, but so much like man in most things. . . . I do believe it already

understands much English; and I am of the mind it might be taught to speak or make signs.

ENTRY IN SAMUEL PEPYS’S DIARY, 1661







Language and Thought

It was intended that when Newspeak had been adopted once and for all and Oldspeak

forgotten, a heretical thought—that is, a thought diverging from the principles of IngSoc—

should be literally unthinkable, at least so far as thought is dependent on words.

GEORGE ORWELL, appendix to 1984, 1949

The limits of my language mean the limits of my world.

LUDWIG WITTGENSTEIN, Tractatus Logico-Philosophicus, 1922







SHERMAN’S LAGOON © 2011 JIM TOOMEY






Summary

Summary 25







References for Further Reading




Exercises



Exercises 29






Exercises 31






33

2Morphology: The Words of Language

By words the mind is winged.

ARISTOPHANES (450 BCE–388 BCE)

A powerful agent is the right word. Whenever we come upon one of those intensely right

words . . . the resulting effect is physical as well as spiritual, and electrically prompt.

MARK TWAIN



34 CHAPTER 2 Morphology: The Words of Language



Content Words and Function Words 35

Content Words and Function Words

“. . . and even . . . the patriotic archbishop of Canterbury found it advisable—”

“Found what?” said the Duck.

“Found it,” the Mouse replied rather crossly; “of course you know what ‘it’ means.”

“I know what ‘it’ means well enough, when I find a thing,” said the Duck; “it’s generally a

frog or a worm. The question is, what did the archbishop find?”

LEWIS CARROLL, Alice’s Adventures in Wonderland, 1865




Morphemes: The Minimal Units of Meaning

“They gave it me,” Humpty Dumpty continued, “for an un-birthday present.”

“I beg your pardon?” Alice said with a puzzled air.

“I’m not offended,” said Humpty Dumpty.

“I mean, what is an un-birthday present?”

“A present given when it isn’t your birthday, of course.”




Morphemes: The Minimal Units of Meaning 37

A B




The Discreteness of Morphemes

9 CHICKWEED LANE © 2011 Brooke McEldowney. Reprinted by permission of Universal Uclick for UFS. All rights reserved.




Bound and Free Morphemes

LUANN © (2005) GEC Inc. Reprinted by permission of Universal Uclick for UFS. All rights reserved.




Prefixes and Suffixes




Infixes

Nouns/Adjectives Verbs

Circumfixes




Affirmative Negative

Roots and Stems




Bound Roots

It had been a rough day, so when I walked into the party I was very chalant, despite my

efforts to appear gruntled and consolate. I was furling my wieldy umbrella . . . when I saw

her. . . . She was a descript person. . . . Her hair was kempt, her clothing shevelled, and she

moved in a gainly way.

JACK WINTER, “How I Met My Wife” by Jack Winter from The New Yorker, July 25, 1994. Reprinted by permission of the Estate of Jack Winter.

Rules of Word Formation

“I never heard of ‘Uglification,’” Alice ventured to say. “What is it?” The Gryphon lifted

up both its paws in surprise. “Never heard of uglifying!” it exclaimed. “You know what to

beautify is, I suppose?” “Yes,” said Alice doubtfully: “it means—to make—prettier.” “Well,

then,” the Gryphon went on, “if you don’t know what to uglify is, you are a simpleton.”





Derivational Morphology

Macnelly/King Features Syndicate




Noun to Adjective Verb to Noun Adjective to Adverb

Noun to Verb Adjective to Noun Verb to Adjective

Adjective to Verb

Noun to Noun Verb to Verb Adjective to Adjective




Inflectional Morphology

Zits Partnership/King Features Syndicate




English Inflectional Morphemes Examples




Inflectional Derivational

Grammatical function Lexical function

No word class change May cause word class change

Small or no meaning change Some meaning change

Often required by rules of grammar Never required by rules of grammar

Follow derivational morphemes in a word

Precede inflectional morphemes in a word

Productive Some productive, many nonproductive




The Hierarchical Structure of Words

(ENGLISH) MORPHEMES

BOUND FREE

OPEN CLASS

(CONTENT OR

LEXICAL)

WORDS

nouns (girl)

adjectives (pretty)

verbs (love)

adverbs (away)

INFLECTIONALDERIVATIONAL

PREFIX

pre-

un-

con-

SUFFIX

-ly

-ist

-ment

SUFFIX

-ing -er -s

-s -est -’s

-en

-ed

ROOT

-ceive

-mit

-fer

AFFIX CLOSED CLASS

(FUNCTION OR

GRAMMATICAL)

WORDS

conjunctions (and)

prepositions (in)

articles (the)

pronouns (she)

auxiliary verbs (is)

FIGURE 2.1 | Classification of English morphemes.

Adjective

3

3un Adjective

Noun atic

g

system




Adverb

4

Adjective ly

4

Adjective al

4

un Adjective

3

Noun atic

g

system

Noun

3

un Noun

g

system




Verb

4

Verb s

4

Verbre

4

izeAdjective

g

nal

Adjective Adjective

33

un Adjective ableVerb

3 3

Verb able un

lock

Verb

gg

lock




Rule Productivity

“Curiouser and curiouser!” cried Alice (she was so much surprised, that for the moment

she quite forgot how to speak good English).


BABY BLUES © 2011 BABY BLUES PARTNERSHIP. KING FEATURES SYNDICATE







Exceptions and Suppletions

The exception gives Authority to the Rule

GIOVANNI TORRIANO, A Common Place of Italian Proverbs, 1666




Lexical Gaps

United Feature Syndicate




Other Morphological Processes

Back-Formations

[A girl] was delighted by her discovery that eats and cats were really eat + -s and cat + -s.

She used her new suffix snipper to derive mik (mix), upstair, downstair, clo (clothes), len

(lens), brefek (from brefeks, her word for breakfast), trappy (trapeze), even Santa Claw.

STEVEN PINKER, Words and Rules: The Ingredients of Language, 1999




Compounds

[T]he Houynhnms have no Word in their Language to express any thing that is evil, except

what they borrow from the Deformities or ill Qualities of the Yahoos. Thus they denote

the Folly of a Servant, an Omission of a Child, a Stone that cuts their feet, a Continuance

of foul or unseasonable Weather, and the like, by adding to each the Epithet of Yahoo.

For instance, Hnhm Yahoo, Whnaholm Yahoo, Ynlhmnawihlma Yahoo, and an ill contrived

House, Ynholmhnmrohlnw Yahoo.

JONATHAN SWIFT, Gulliver’s Travels, 1726

Adjective Noun Verb




Meaning of Compounds

(1) Noun (2) Noun

Noun Noun Adjective Noun

Adjective rack top NounNoun Noun

rackhathattop

FAMILY CIRCUS © 2009 BIL KEANE, INC. KING

FEATURES SYNDICATE




Universality of Compounding




“Pullet Surprises”

Word Student’s Definition

Sign Language Morphology



Morphological Analysis: Identifying Morphemes 61

Morphological Analysis: Identifying Morphemes

Case study 1

Adjective Meaning




Case study 2



Morphological Analysis: Identifying Morphemes 63

Case study 3

Case study 4




touch starve watch buy call live play



Summary 65

Summary





Exercises



A B

A B

Exercises 67






Root Infinitive Past Participle

Exercises 69






Word Definition

Exercises 71




Words Nonwords



Exercises 73






Exercises 75



76

3Syntax: The Sentence Patterns of Language

To grammar even kings bow.

J. B. MOLIÈRE, Les Femmes Savantes, II, 1672




What the Syntax Rules Do

“Then you should say what you mean,” the March Hare went on.

“I do,” Alice hastily replied, “at least—I mean what I say—that’s the same thing, you know.”

“Not the same thing a bit!” said the Hatter. “You might just as well say that ‘I see what I

eat’ is the same thing as ‘I eat what I see’!”

“You might just as well say,” added the March Hare, “that ‘I like what I get’ is the same

thing as ‘I get what I like’!”

“You might just as well say,” added the Dormouse . . . “that ‘I breathe when I sleep’ is the

same thing as ‘I sleep when I breathe’!”

“It is the same thing with you,” said the Hatter.




78 CHAPTER 3 Syntax: The Sentence Patterns of Language




old men and women old men and women

Hilary B. Price. King Features Syndicate




What Grammaticality Is Not Based On

Colorless green ideas sleep furiously. This is a very interesting sentence, because it shows

that syntax can be separated from semantics—that form can be separated from meaning.

The sentence doesn’t seem to mean anything coherent, but it sounds like an English

sentence.

HOWARD LASNIK, The Human Language: Part One, 1995




Sentence Structure

I really do not know that anything has ever been more exciting than diagramming

sentences.

GERTRUDE STEIN, “Poetry and Grammar,” 1935




the

root

child found

a puppy

Constituents and Constituency Tests




the puppy played

in

the garden




Syntactic Categories

© The New Yorker Collection 2003 William Haefeli from cartoonbank.

com All Rights Reserved.







Lexical and Functional Categories

There are ten parts of speech, and they are all troublesome.

MARK TWAIN, “The Awful German Language,” in A Tramp Abroad, 1880

Phrasal categories

Lexical categories




Phrase Structure TreesWho climbs the Grammar-Tree distinctly knows

Where Noun and Verb and Participle grows.

JOHN DRYDEN, “The Sixth Satyr of Juvenal,” 1693




NP:

the

mother of James Whistler

VP:

Pavarottising an aria




AP:

Janewary of snakes

PP:

justover the hill

NP

Nspeci er of N

N (head)

mother of James Whistler

the PP (complement of N)

VP

Vspeci er of V

V (head)

sing an aria

Pavarotti NP (complement of V)

AP

Aspeci er of A

V (head)

wary of snakes

Jane PP (complement of A)




PP

Pspeci er of P

P (head)

over the hill

just NP (complement of P)

XP

Xspeci er of X

X (head) Complement of X

qp

wo

N

NP

g

N

g

oxygen

g

V

VP

g

V

g

sleeps

g

A

AP

g

A

g

beautiful

g

P

PP

g

P

g

in

g




XP

XSpeci er

Complement X (head)

X

X (head) Complement

NP

S

VP

2




g

wo

qp S

VP

wo V

N

V NP

found Det

a

gN

puppy

g

g

wo

N

NP

Det

the

gN

child

g

g g




Selection

XP

(Specifier)

X (Complement)

wo

qpX




PP

qp

NP P

g wo

John P NP

g 5on

the boat




Building Phrase Structure TreesEveryone who is master of the language he speaks . . . may form new . . . phrases, provided

they coincide with the genius of the language.

JOHANN DAVID MICHAELIS, “Dissertation,” 1739




NP

S

VP

S

3

NP VP

3

Det N

S

NP VP

3

3 g

Det VN

a N V PP

V

S

NP VP

Det N




S

NP VP

Det V a N

V

PP

hyena laughed

P NP

at

N

me

N

N

P

S

NP VP

Det N V

every N V

girl read

NP

Det N

some N

poetry




S

qp

NP VPei g

Det Ng g wo

the N V PPg g g

boy bikedwo

woP

gto

P

V

g g

g

NP

Det N

the N

store

NP

qp

Det

g wothe N PP

g g

father

wo

woP

gof

N

P

g g

g

NP

Det N

the N

bride




NP

(2)

(LI, 8)

(LI, 9)

(10)

(LI, 2)

(LI, 3)

(LI)

Det

the

Det

the

N

majority

P NP

of

PP

N

senate

N

N

P

V

VP

N

N

vice-president

APV

became

(4)

(7)

(13)

(LI, l1)

(LI, 9)

(LI, 2)

(LI, 3)

(LI)

(10)

A

afraid

PP

P

of

Det

the

NP

A

P

S

NP (from above) VP (from above)

the majority of the senate became afraid of the vice-president Copyright 2013 Cengage Learning. All Rights Reserved. May not be copied, scanned, or duplicated, in whole or in part. Due to electronic rights, some third party content may be suppressed from the eBook and/or eChapter(s).



The Infinity of Language: Recursive RulesSo, naturalists observe, a flea

Hath smaller fleas that on him prey;

And these have smaller still to bite ’em,

And so proceed ad infinitum.

JONATHAN SWIFT, “On Poetry, a Rhapsody,” 1733

NP

Det

A

the kindhearted A

intelligent A

handsome N

boy

N

N

N

N

NP

3

A NP

3

A NP

3

Det N̅




Newspaper Enterprise Association/United Features Syndicate

Int

really Int

very

A

pretty

A

A

A




PP

V over the hills

PP

through the woods

PP

to the cave

go

V

V

V

V

Adjunct Adjunct

X

XX

X




NP

Det

the PP (adjunct)

N

boat NP (complement)

Det

the

P

in

AP (adjunct)

N

ocean PP (adjunct)

A

white P NP (complement)

with

PP (adjunct)

N from the gale

foam

N

N

N

N

N

N

A

A

P

P




What Heads the SentenceMight, could, would—they are contemptible auxiliaries.

GEORGE ELIOT (MARY ANN EVANS), Middlemarch, 1872




TP

Speci er

T (head) Complement

T

TP

NP TT±pst

Modal

VP

TP

NP the

girl

T VP

may cry

TP

NP the

child

T VP+pst

eat

T T

Structural AmbiguitiesThe structure of every sentence is a lesson in logic.

JOHN STUART MILL, Inaugural address at St. Andrews, 1867




TP

NP

T

+pst

VP

V NP

see Det

the PP

N

man P NP

with the telescope

the boy

V

N

P

N

T

TP

NP

the boy T

+pst

VP

PP

V NP with the telescope

the man

V

V

see

T




More Structures

MacNelly/King Features Syndicate

TP

NP

the dog T VP +pst

AdvP

completely V NP

destroy the house

V

T

V




TP

NP

the dog T VP+pst

AdvP

V NP yesterday

destroy the house

T

V

V

VP

g

V NP AdvP

curse

ei

ei ei

g

g ei g

the day

I was born

V (on) the day

I was born

curse

V

VP

g

V

V




Transformational Analysis

I put the words down and push them a bit.

EVELYN WAUGH, quoted in The New York Times, April 11, 1966

TP

NP

the boy T VP

can sleep

T




Must the boy ___ sleep




The Structure Dependency of RulesMethod consists entirely in properly ordering and arranging the things to which we should

pay attention.

RENÉ DESCARTES, Oeuvres, vol. X, c. 1637

TP

NP

T VP–pst

3rd

The guy ============

T

seems kind of cute




TP

NP

The boy who can run fastest T VP

will win

Move

T

Further Syntactic Dependencies




Wh Questions

Whom are you? said he, for he had been to night school.

GEORGE ADE, “The Steel Box,” in Bang! Bang!, 1928




UG Principles and Parameters

Whenever the literary German dives into a sentence, that is the last you are going to see of

him till he emerges on the other side of the Atlantic with his Verb in his mouth.

MARK TWAIN, A Connecticut Yankee in King Arthur’s Court, 1889



UG Principles and Parameters 115






Sign Language Syntax 117

Sign Language Syntax






Appendix A 119

APPENDIX A

The boy will sleep → will the boy ___ sleep

CP

Speci er of C

C (head) Complement of C

C

CP

g

3

C TP

5 +Q

C




CP

C TP+Q

the boy

NP

T VP

will sleep

T

C

CP

g

C TP+Q

NPg

5 ei

ei

ei

T

the boy T VP

g

5

sleep

T

C

will



Appendix B 121

NP PP

P CP

about C

TP C TP

that NP T whether NP T

N

N

T VP N T VP

will V

V

N CP

belief C

C

N

iron

–pst

iron V

V

!oat sink

N P

APPENDIX B

CP

C

C TP

+Q

NP T

T VP

N

N

will V

chase N

Max V NP

N

what

Speci er of CP




N C

N

+Q

T

T

VP

will

CP

NP C

what

V NP

chase

TP

NP

N T

N V

Max

CP

qp

Speci er of CP

C

C

TP

qp

qp

+Q

NP T

T VP

–pstg

N V

N

g

N

g

g qp

qp

qp

N

g

g

Pete V NP

g

like Det

g

which

toys



Appendix B 123

CP

qp

NP C

Det N C TP

g g ei

ei

eiei

which N

+Q

NP T

g ei

N T VP

g

N V

g

g

g

Pete V NP

toys

g

like

T

–pst

CP

NP C

Det N C TP

which N

+Q

NP T

toys T N T VP

–pst

N V

do

Pete V NP

[do-insertion] like




TP

T VP

g g

g

have

qp

qp

qp

6g

qp

NP

Spot

must

V VP

g

V NP

found a squirrel

V

V

T



Appendix B 125

TP

T

NP

Nellie T VP –pst

snores

CP

Speci er of CP C

C TP

+Q

NP T

Spot T VP

–pstg

V

eo

eo

eo

eo

eo

eo

V VP

g

has V

V NP

g

chased what

g




CP

Speci!er of CP C

C TP+Q

TNP

T VP [–pst]

g g

has ei

ei

ei

ei

ei

ei

g

V

Spot

V VP

V NP

g

whatchased

V

V

CP

qp

Speci er of CP

ei

C

C

TP

ei +Q

NP T

T VP

–pst

4 ei SpotHas

chased what

V

g 5

g

V

V

ei V VP

ei NP

g



Appendix C 127

NP

chased

ei

ei

ei

ei

eo

eiV

VP

V

V

V

VP

TP

T

–pstThas Spot

CP

C

CWhat

Speci!er of CP

+Q

NP

g

g

g

g

APPENDIX C




Summary




Exercises

Exercises 129






Exercises 131






Exercises 133






Exercises 135




TPqp

NP Two

Jean T VP–pst

qp

qpAdvP V

V

g

g

toujours V NP

g

boit du vin



Exercises 137






139

Surely all this is not without meaning.

4The Meaning of Language

HERMAN MELVILLE, Moby-Dick, 1851



140 CHAPTER 4 The Meaning of Language

What Speakers Know about Sentence Meaning

Language without meaning is meaningless.

ROMAN JAKOBSON

Truth

. . . Having Occasion to talk of Lying and false Representation, it was with much Difficulty

that he comprehended what I meant. . . . For he argued thus: That the Use of Speech was

to make us understand one another and to receive Information of Facts; now if any one

said the Thing which was not, these Ends were defeated; because I cannot properly be said

to understand him. . . . And these were all the Notions he had concerning that Faculty of

Lying, so perfectly well understood, and so universally practiced among human Creatures.




What Speakers Know about Sentence Meaning 141

Entailment and Related Notions

You mentioned your name as if I should recognize it, but beyond the obvious facts that

you are a bachelor, a solicitor, a Freemason, and an asthmatic, I know nothing whatever

about you.

SIR ARTHUR CONAN DOYLE, “The Norwood Builder,” in The Memoirs of Sherlock Holmes, 1894




Ambiguity

Let’s pass gas.

SEEN ON A SIGN IN THE LUNCHROOM OF AN ELECTRIC UTILITY COMPANY




Compositional Semantics

To manage a system effectively, you might focus on the interactions of the parts rather

than their behavior taken separately.

RUSSELL L. ACKOFF

TP(1) (2)

NP

the boy T VP+pst

V NP

seeDet

the PP

N

man P NP

with the telescope

TP

NP

the boy T VP+pst

PP

V NP with the telescope

see the man

qp

5 ei

g

gg

V_

T_

gg

g

g

g

g

6

qp

5 ei

ei

ei

ei

ei

ei

ei 6

6

N_

N_

P_

T_

V_

V_




Semantic Rules

swim

TP

NP

Jack T VP

wo

wo 5

5

T_

-pst




Semantic Rule I

TP

NP

-pstT VP

wo

wo T_

TP

+pstT VP

V

kiss

NP

Jack

NP

Laura

wo

wo

wo

5

5

g

g

T_

V_




Semantic Rule II

VP

V NP

V




When Compositionality Goes Awry

A loose sally of the mind; an irregular undigested piece; not a regular and orderly

composition.

SAMUEL JOHNSON (1709–1784)

Anomaly

Don’t tell me of a man’s being able to talk sense; everyone can talk sense. Can he talk

nonsense?

WILLIAM PITT

There is no greater mistake in the world than the looking upon every sort of nonsense as

want of sense.

LEIGH HUNT, “On the Talking of Nonsense,” 1820







Metaphor

Our doubts are traitors.

WILLIAM SHAKESPEARE, Measure for Measure, c. 1603

Walls have ears.

MIGUEL DE CERVANTES, Don Quixote, 1605

The night has a thousand eyes and the day but one.

FRANCES WILLIAM BOURDILLON, “Light,” 1873




Idioms

ARGYLE SWEATER © 2010 Scott Hilburn.

Dist. By UNIVERSAL UCLICK. Reprinted with

permission. All rights reserved.







Lexical Semantics (Word Meanings)

“There’s glory for you!”

“I don’t know what you mean by ‘glory,’” Alice said.

Humpty Dumpty smiled contemptuously.

“Of course you don’t—till I tell you. I meant ‘there’s a nice knock-down argument for you!’”

“But ‘glory’ doesn’t mean ‘a nice knock-down argument,’” Alice objected.




“When I use a word,” Humpty Dumpty said, in rather a scornful tone, “it means just what I

choose it to mean—neither more nor less.”

“The question is,” said Alice, “whether you can make words mean so many different things.”


Theories of Word Meaning

It is natural . . . to think of there being connected with a sign . . . besides . . . the reference

of the sign, also what I should like to call the sense of the sign. . . .

GOTTLOB FREGE, “On Sense and Reference,” 1892




Reference

Michael Maslin / The New Yorker Collection/Cartoonbank.com




Sense

Lexical Relations

Does he wear a turban, a fez or a hat?

Does he sleep on a mattress, a bed or a mat, or a Cot,

The Akond of Swat?

Can he write a letter concisely clear,

Without a speck or a smudge or smear or Blot,

The Akond of Swat?

EDWARD LEAR, “The Akond of Swat,” in Laughable Lyrics, 1877







Hilary B. Price/King Features Syndicate




Semantic Features

If it is true that words have meanings, why don’t we throw away words and keep just the

meanings?

LUDWIG WITTGENSTEIN




Evidence for Semantic Features

Semantic Features and Grammar

King Features Syndicate




Semantic Features of Nouns




Semantic Features of Verbs




Argument Structure




Thematic Roles

A feminine boy from Khartoum

Took a masculine girl to his room

They spent the whole night

In one hell of a fight

About who should do what—and to whom?

ANONYMOUS LIMERICK, quoted in More Limericks, G. Legman (ed.), 1977






Pragmatics 165

Pragmatics




We interpret this sketch instantly and effortlessly as a gathering of people before a

structure, probably a gateway; the people are listening to a single declaiming figure in

the center. . . . But all this is a miracle, for there is little detailed information in the lines or

shading (such as there is). Every line is a mere suggestion. . . . So here is the miracle: from a

merest, sketchiest squiggle of lines, you and I converge to find adumbration of a coherent

scene. . . . The problem of utterance interpretation is not dissimilar to this visual miracle.

An utterance is not, as it were, a veridical model or “snapshot” of the scene it describes. . . .

Rather, an utterance is just as sketchy as the Rembrandt drawing.

STEPHEN C. LEVINSON, Presumptive Meanings: The Theory of Generalized Conversational Implicature, 2000

Pronouns and Other Deictic Words

chicken (shouting to friend across the road): Hey, how do I get to the other side?

friend: You’re on the other side!

SOURCE OBSCURE



Pragmatics 167

Pronouns and Situational Context

Hank Ketcham/North America Syndicate/King Features Syndicate




Pronouns and Linguistic Context

King Features Syndicate



Pragmatics 169




Implicature

What does “yet” mean, after all? “I haven’t seen Reservoir Dogs yet.” What does that mean?

It means you’re going to go, doesn’t it?

NICK HORNBY, High Fidelity, 1995

LUANN © (2009) GEC Inc. Reprinted by permission of Universal Uclick for UFS. All rights reserved.



Pragmatics 171

Maxims of Conversation

Polonius: Though this be madness, yet there is method in’t.

WILLIAM SHAKESPEARE, Hamlet, c. 1600






Pragmatics 173




Presupposition

“Take some more tea,” the March Hare said to Alice, very earnestly.

“I’ve had nothing yet,” Alice replied in an offended tone, “so I can’t take more.”

“You mean you can’t take less,” said the Hatter: “It’s very easy to take more than nothing.”

LEWIS CARROLL, Alice’s Adventures in Wonderland

Speech Acts

ZITS © 1998 ZITS PARTNERSHIP, KING FEATURES SYNDICATE



Summary 175

Summary











Exercises



Exercises 179






Exercises 181






Exercises 183






Exercises 185






Exercises 187






189

5Phonetics: The Sounds of Language

I gradually came to see that Phonetics had an important bearing on human relations—

that when people of different nations pronounce each other’s languages really well

(even if vocabulary & grammar not perfect), it has an astonishing effect of bringing

them together, it puts people on terms of equality, a good understanding between them

immediately springs up.

FROM THE JOURNAL OF DANIEL JONES



190 CHAPTER 5 Phonetics: The Sounds of Language

Sound Segments

LaughingStock Licensing/Ottawa, Canada



Sound Segments 191

Identity of Speech Sounds

By infinitesimal movements of the tongue countless different vowels can be produced, all

of them in use among speakers of English who utter the same vowels no oftener than they

make the same fingerprints.

GEORGE BERNARD SHAW, 1950




The Phonetic Alphabet

The English have no respect for their language, and will not teach their children to speak it.

They cannot spell it because they have nothing to spell it with but an old foreign alphabet

of which only the consonants—and not all of them—have any agreed speech value.

GEORGE BERNARD SHAW, Preface to Pygmalion, 1912



Sound Segments 193

TABLE 5.1 | A Phonetic Alphabet for English Pronunciation

Consonants Vowels

pill till kill beet bit

bill dill gill bait bet

mill nil ring boot foot

feel seal heal boat bore

veal zeal leaf bat pot/bar

thigh chill reef butt sofa

thy gin you bite bout

shill which witch boy

measure




Spelling Pronunciation

Articulatory Phonetics

The voice is articulated by the lips and the tongue. . . . Man speaks by means of the air

which he inhales into his entire body and particularly into the body cavities. When the

air is expelled through the empty space it produces a sound, because of the resonances




in the skull. The tongue articulates by its strokes; it gathers the air in the throat and pushes

it against the palate and the teeth, thereby giving the sound a definite shape. If the tongue

would not articulate each time, by means of its strokes, man would not speak clearly and

would only be able to produce a few simple sounds.

HIPPOCRATES (460–377 BCE)

Consonants

Place of Articulation

Lolita, light of my life, fire of my loins. My sin, my soul. Lo-lee-ta: the tip of the tongue

taking a trip of three steps down the palate to tap, at three, on the teeth. Lo. Lee. Ta.

VLADIMIR NABOKOV, Lolita, 1955




NASAL CAVITY

PH

AR

YN

X

TONGUE

alveolar ridgeteeth

lip

palate

velum(soft palate)

uvula

8 glottis

lip

1 2 34

56

7

ORAL

FIGURE 5.1 | The vocal tract. Places of articulation: 1. bilabial; 2. labiodental; 3. interdental; 4. alveolar; 5. (alveo)palatal; 6. velar; 7. uvular; 8. glottal.




Manner of Articulation




Voiced and Voiceless Sounds

TABLE 5.2 | Places of Articulation of English Consonants

Bilabial

Labiodental

Interdental

Alveolar

Palatal

Velar

Glottal




Nasal and Oral Sounds

FIGURE 5.2 | Timing of lip closure and vocal-cord vibrations for voiced, voiceless unaspirated, and voiceless aspirated bilabial stops [b], [p], [ph].




FIGURE 5.3 | Position of lips and velum for m (lips together, velum down) and b, p (lips together, velum up).




TABLE 5.3 | Four Classes of Speech Sounds

Oral Nasal

Voiced

Voiceless

*Nasal consonants in English are usually voiced. Both voiced and voiceless nasal sounds occur in other languages.







Phonetic Symbols for American English Consonants




TABLE 5.4 | Some Phonetic Symbols for American English Consonants

Bilabial Labiodental Interdental Alveolar Palatal Velar Glottal

Stop (oral)

voiceless

voiced

Nasal (voiced)

Fricative

voiceless

voiced

Affricate

voiceless

voiced

Glide

voiceless

voiced

Liquid (voiced)

(central)

(lateral)

TABLE 5.5 | Examples of Consonants in English Words


Stop (oral) voiceless pie tie kite ( )uh-( )oh

voiced buy die guy

Nasal (voiced) my night sing

Fricative

voiceless fine thigh sue shoe high

voiced vine thy zoo measure

Affricate

voiceless cheese

voiced jump

Glide

voiceless which which

voiced wipe you wipe

Liquid (voiced)

(central) rye

(lateral) lye




VowelsHiggins: Tired of listening to sounds?

Pickering: Yes. It’s a fearful strain. I rather fancied myself because I can pronounce

twenty-four distinct vowel sounds, but your hundred and thirty beat me. I

can’t hear a bit of difference between most of them.

Higgins: Oh, that comes with practice. You hear no difference at first, but

you keep on listening and presently you find they’re all as different

as A from B.

GEORGE BERNARD SHAW, Pygmalion, 1912

Tongue Position




FIGURE 5.4 | Position of the tongue in producing the vowels in he, who, and hah.




Lip Rounding

Diphthongs

Part of the Tongue Involved

Tongue

HeightFRONT CENTRAL BACK

HIGH u boot

ROUNDED ʊ put

MID o boat

ǝ about

ᴧ butt

LOW

i beet

ɪ bit

e bait

ɛ bet

æ bat a balm ɔ bawd

FIGURE 5.5 | Classification of American English vowels.




Nasalization of Vowels

Tense and Lax Vowels

Tense Lax

Major Phonetic Classes



Major Phonetic Classes 209

Noncontinuants and Continuants

Obstruents and Sonorants

Consonantal Sounds




Syllabic Sounds

Prosodic Features

ZITS © 2011 ZITS PARTNERSHIP, KING FEATURES SYNDICATE



Prosodic Features 211

Tone and Intonation






Phonetic Symbols and Spelling Correspondences 213

LH L H LH L L L HL LH H

7

6

5

4

3

2

1

Phonetic Symbols and Spelling Correspondences

I never had any large respect for good spelling.

MARK TWAIN, Autobiography




TABLE 5.6 | Phonetic Symbol/English Spelling Correspondences

Consonants

Symbol Examples

spit, tip, Lapp

pit, prick, plaque, appear

bit, tab, brat, bubble

mitt, tam, smack, Emmy, comb, Autumn

stick, pit, kissed, write

tick, intend, pterodactyl, attack

Dick, cad, drip, loved, ride

nick, kin, snow, mnemonic, gnome, pneumatic, know

skin, stick, scat, critique, elk

curl, kin, charisma, critic, mechanic, close

girl, burg, longer, Pittsburgh

sing, think, finger

fat, philosophy, flat, phlogiston, coffee, reef, cough

vat, dove, gravel

sip, skip, psychology, pass, pats, democracy, scissors, fasten, deceive, descent

zip, jazz, razor, pads, kisses, Xerox, design, lazy, scissors, maize

thigh, through, wrath, ether, Matthew

thy, their, weather, lathe, either

shoe, mush, mission, nation, fish, glacial, sure

measure, vision, azure, casual, genre, rouge

match, rich, righteous

choke, Tchaikovsky, discharge

judge, midget, George, magistrate, residual

leaf, feel, call, single

reef, fear, Paris, singer

you, yes, feud, use

witch, swim, queen

which, where, whale (for speakers who pronounce which differently from witch)

hat, who, whole, rehash

bottle, button, glottal (for some speakers), ( )uh-( )oh

writer, rider, latter, ladder



The “Phonetics” of Signed Languages 215

The “Phonetics” of Signed Languages

Vowels

beet, beat, be, receive, key, believe, amoeba, people, Caesar, Vaseline, serene,

Raleigh

bit, consist, injury, bin, women, build

gate, bait, ray, great, eight, gauge, greyhound, rein, feign

bet, serenity, says, guest, dead, said

pan, act, laugh, comrade

boot, lute, who, sewer, through, to, too, two, move, Lou, true, suit

put, foot, butcher, could

cut, tough, among, oven, does, cover, flood

coat, go, beau, grow, though, toe, own, sew

caught, stalk, core, saw, ball, awe, auto

cot, father, palm, sergeant, honor, hospital, melodic

sofa, alone, symphony, suppose, melody, bird, verb, the

bite, sight, by, buy, die, dye, aisle, choir, guide, island, height, sign

about, brown, doubt, coward, sauerkraut

boy, oil, Reuters

TABLE 5.6 | (Continued)




Summary



Summary 217





Exercises



� �

Exercises 219






A B

Exercises 221






Exercises 223



224

Phonology: The Sound Patterns of Language

6

Be a craftsman in speech that thou mayest be strong, for the strength of one is the tongue.

PTAHHOTEP, CA 2400 BCE

Phonology is the study of telephone etiquette.

A HIGH SCHOOL STUDENT




The Pronunciation of Morphemes

The t is silent, as in Harlow.

MARGOT ASQUITH, referring to her name being mispronounced by the actress Jean Harlow

The Pronunciation of Plurals



226 CHAPTER 6 Phonology: The Sound Patterns of Language

A B C D

Allomorph Environment

θ

θ





θ





Basic

representation

Phonetic

representation

Apply rule (1) NA* NA

Apply rule (2) NA NA

*NA means “not applicable.”

bus 1 pl. butt 1 pl. bug 1 pl.

Basic representation

Phonetic representation

Apply rule (2)

Apply rule (1)

Additional Examples of Allomorphs







Phonemes: The Phonological Units of Language

In the physical world the naive speaker and hearer actualize and are sensitive to sounds,

but what they feel themselves to be pronouncing and hearing are “phonemes.”

EDWARD SAPIR, “The Psychological Reality of Phonemes,” 1933

Illustration of Allophones



Phonemes: The Phonological Units of Language 231

TABLE 6.1 | Nasal and Oral Vowels: Words and Nonwords

Words Nonwords

be [bi] bead [bid] bean [b n] *[b ] *[b d] *[bin]

lay [le] lace [les] lame [l m] *[l ] *[l s] *[lem]

TABLE 6.2 | Distribution of Aspirated Voiceless Stops

Syllable-Initial before After a Syllable-a Stressed Vowel Initial /s/ Nonword*




Spelling Phonemic Phonetic representation representation

Phonemes and How to Find Them



Phonemes: The Phonological Units of Language 233

Complementary Distribution

TABLE 6.3 | Distribution of Oral and Nasal Vowels in English Syllables

In Final Position Before Nasal Consonants Before Oral Consonants

Oral vowels Yes No Yes

Nasal vowels No Yes No







The Need for Similarity

Distinctive Features of Phonemes




Feature Values

p b m




b m d n g ŋ

Nondistinctive Features




Phonemic Patterns May Vary across Languages

The tongue of man is a twisty thing, there are plenty of words there of every kind, the

range of words is wide, and their variance.

HOMER, The Iliad, c. 900 BCE

Voiceless Unaspirated Voiceless Aspirated




Natural Classes of Speech Sounds

It’s as large as life, and twice as natural!





TABLE 6.4 | Feature Specification of Major Natural Classes of Sounds

Features Obstruents Nasals Liquids Glides Vowels

Consonantal + + + – –

Sonorant – + + + +

Syllabic – +/– +/– – +

Nasal – + – – +/–




Feature Specifications for American English Consonants and Vowels

TABLE 6.5 | Features of Some American English Vowels

Features i e ɛ æ u ʊ o ɔ a

High + + – – – + + – – – – –

Low – – – – + – – – + + + –

Back – – – – – + + + + – – –

Central – – – – – – – – – + + +

Round – – – – – + + + + – – –

Tense + – + – – + – + + + – –

The Rules of Phonology

But that to come

Shall all be done by the rule.

WILLIAM SHAKESPEARE, Antony and Cleopatra, 1623



TABLE 6.6 | Features of Some American English Consonants

Features p b m t d n k g ŋ f v θ ð s z ∫ ʒ l r j w h

Consonantal + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + – – –

Sonorant – – + – – + – – + – – – – – – – – – – + + + + +

Syllabic – – –/+ – – –/+ – – –/+ – – – – – – – – – – –/+ –/+ – – –

Nasal – – + – – + – – + – – – – – – – – – – – – – – –

Voiced – + + – + + – + + – + – + – + – + – + + + + + –

Continuant – – – – – – – – – + + + + + + + + – – + + + + +

Labial + + + – – – – – – + + – – – – – – – – – – – + –

Alveolar – – – + + + – – – – – – – + + – – – – + + – – –

Palatal – – – – – – – – – – – – – – – + + + + – – + – –

Anterior + + + + + + – – – + + + + + + – – – – + + – – –

Velar – – – – – – + + + – – – – – – – – – – – – – + –

Coronal – – – + + + – – – – – + + + + + + + + + + + – –

Sibilant – – – – – – – – – – – – – + + + + + + – – – – –

Note: The phonemes /r/ and /l/ are distinguished by the feature [lateral], not shown here. /l/ is the only phoneme that would be [+lateral].

Co

py

righ

t 20

13

Cen

gag

e Learn

ing

. All R

igh

ts Reserv

ed. M

ay n

ot b

e cop

ied, scan

ned

, or d

up

licated, in

wh

ole o

r in p

art. Du

e to electro

nic rig

hts, so

me th

ird p

arty co

nten

t may

be su

pp

ressed fro

m th

e eBo

ok

and

/or eC

hap

ter(s).

Ed

itorial rev

iew h

as deem

ed th

at any

sup

pressed

con

tent d

oes n

ot m

aterially affect th

e ov

erall learnin

g ex

perien

ce. Cen

gag

e Learn

ing

reserves th

e righ

t to rem

ov

e add

ition

al con

tent at an

y tim

e if sub

sequ

ent rig

hts restrictio

ns req

uire it.


Feature-Changing Rules

Assimilation Rules







“bob” “boom”

Phonemic representation

Apply nasal rule NA ↓

Nasality: phonetic feature value – – – – + +

Phonetic representation [b a b] [b m]u

/b a b/ /b u m/

Dissimilation Rules




Dennis the Menace, Hank Ketcham. Reprinted with permission of North America Syndicate.




-al -ar

Segment Insertion and Deletion Rules




A B

ε

"Tumbleweeds". Tom K. Ryan. Reprinted with permission of North America Syndicate.




From One to Many and from Many to One

Function Example

A B




German Phonemes /d/

German Phones [d]

/t/

[t]

The Function of Phonological Rules

Phonemic (Mental Lexicon) Representation of Words

in a Sentence

Phonetic Representation of Words in a Sentence

Phonological rules (P-rules)

input

output




Underlying phonemic representation / t m p s t /

Aspiration rule

Nasalization rule

Schwa rule

Surface phonetic representation [ m p s t ]

Slips of the Tongue: Evidence for Phonological Rules

Intended Utterance Actual Utterance




Prosodic Phonology

Syllable Structure

Baby Blues. Baby Blues Partnership. King Features Syndicate




Onset Rime

CodaNucleus

Word Stress




Sentence and Phrase Stress

“What can I do, Tertius?” said Rosamond, turning her eyes on him again. That little speech

of four words, like so many others in all languages, is capable by varied vocal inflexions

of expressing all states of mind from helpless dimness to exhaustive argumentative

perception, from the completest self-devoting fellowship to the most neutral aloofness.

GEORGE ELIOT, Middlemarch, 1872

Compound Noun Adjective + Noun




Intonation

Depending on inflection, ah bon [in French] can express shock, disbelief, indifference,

irritation, or joy.

PETER MAYLE, Toujours Provence, 1991

Tristram left directions for Isolde to follow.

Tristram left directions for Isolde to follow.




Sequential Constraints of Phonemes

If you were to receive the following telegram, you would have no difficulty in correcting

the “obvious” mistakes:

BEST WISHES FOR VERY HAPPP BIRTFDAY

because sequences such as BIRTFDAY do not occur in the language.

COLIN CHERRY, On Human Communication, 1957



Sequential Constraints of Phonemes 257

Lexical Gaps

The Mungle pilgriffs far awoy

Religeorge too thee worled.

Sam fells on the waysock-side

And somforbe on a gurled,

With all her faulty bagnose!

JOHN LENNON




Why Do Phonological Rules Exist?

No rule is so general, which admits not some exception.

ROBERT BURTON, The Anatomy of Melancholy, 1621



Why Do Phonological Rules Exist? 259

Optimality Theory

Out of clutter, find simplicity.

From discord, find harmony.

ALBERT EINSTEIN (1879–1955)




Phonological Analysis

Everything it is possible to analyze depends on a clear method of distinguishing the similar

from the dissimilar.

CARL LINNAEUS










Phone Environment




Summary








Exercises

Initial Medial Final

Stimulus Reading Pronunciation Writing from Dictation



Exercises 267




A B C



Nonpalatalized Palatalized

Exercises 269




A B C



Word Possible Not Possible Reason

Word Possible Not Possible Reason

[v]—[b] [f]—[p]

Exercises 271






A B

Gloss Informal Formal

Exercises 273




Gloss Informal Formal

a k i

a k i

a e k i

i e am

ma ca

ak i

aki

i i i



Exercises 275




Phonetic Gloss

Phonetic Gloss Phonetic Gloss

) )



Nonsibilant–Initial Verbs Sibilant–Initial Verbs

Word Gloss Word Gloss Word Gloss

Exercises 277




Stem Third person



279

7

Dialects

A language is a dialect that has an army and a navy.

MAX WEINREICH (1894–1969)

Language in Society

Language is a city to the building of which every human being brought a stone.

RALPH WALDO EMERSON, Letters and Social Aims, 1876



280 CHAPTER 7 Language in Society



Dialects 281

Regional Dialects

Phonetics . . . the science of speech. That’s my profession. . . . (I) can spot an Irishman or

a Yorkshireman by his brogue. I can place any man within six miles. I can place him within

two miles in London. Sometimes within two streets.


The educated Southerner has no use for an r except at the beginning of a word.

MARK TWAIN, Life on the Mississippi, 1883






Dialects 283

Phonological Differences

I have noticed in traveling about the country a good many differences in the pronunciation

of common words. . . . Now what I want to know is whether there is any right or wrong

about this matter. . . . If one way is right, why don’t we all pronounce that way and compel

the other fellow to do the same? If there isn’t any right or wrong, why do some persons

make so much fuss about it?

LETTER QUOTED IN “THE STANDARD AMERICAN,” in J. V. Williamson and V. M. Burke, eds., A Various Language, 1971




Lexical Differences

Frank Cho/Creators Syndicate

Syntactic Differences



Dialects 285

Dialect 1 Dialect 2

Dialect Atlases




FIGURE 7.1 | A dialect map showing the isoglosses separating the use of different words

that refer to the same cheese.

Kurath, Hans. “A Word Geography of the Eastern United States.” Ann Arbor, MI: University of Michigan

Press, copyright © 1949. Reprinted with permission of University of Michigan Press.



Dialects 287

Social Dialects

Why do these people speak in such a high pitch? Why do their jaws barely open when they

talk? Why do the ends of their sentences go up as if they’re asking a question? Odd vowels,

clipped words, and always a hiss on the letter s . . . no wonder it’s impossible not to mimic

them.

SUZANNE COLLINS, The Hunger Games, 2008




The “Standard”

We don’t talk fancy grammar and eat anchovy toast. But to live under the kitchen doesn’t

say we aren’t educated.

MARY NORTON, The Borrowers, 1952

Language Purists

A woman who utters such depressing and disgusting sounds has no right to be anywhere—

no right to live. Remember that you are a human being with a soul and the divine gift of

articulate speech: that your native language is the language of Shakespeare and Milton

and the Bible; and don’t sit there crooning like a bilious pigeon.


“For Better or Worse” 2005 Lynn Johnston. Dist by Universal Press Syndicate. All Rights Reserved.



Dialects 289




Banned Languages

A Wisconsin seventh-grader was suspended from a school’s basketball team for speaking

a Native American language. [The school] is 60 percent Native American, yet when a

teacher heard [a female student], 12, telling a friend how to say “I love you” in the

Menominee tongue, the teacher angrily objected, saying, “how do I know you’re not

saying something bad?”

THE WEEK, 2/24/12, P. 6



Dialects 291

African American English

The language, only the language. . . . It is the thing that black people love so much—the

saying of words, holding them on the tongue, experimenting with them, playing with

them. It’s a love, a passion. Its function is like a preacher’s: to make you stand up out of

your seat, make you lose yourself and hear yourself. The worst of all possible things that

could happen would be to lose that language.

TONI MORRISON, interviewed in The New Republic, March 21, 1981




Phonological Differences between African American English and SAE



Dialects 293

r-Deletion

Neutralization of [ ] and [ ] before Nasal Consonants

Diphthong Reduction

Loss of Interdental Fricatives




Syntactic Differences between AAE and SAE

And of his port as meeke as is a mayde

He nevere yet no vileynye ne sayde

GEOFFREY CHAUCER, Prologue to The Canterbury Tales, 14th century

Multiple Negatives

Deletion of the Verb Be

SAE AAE



Dialects 295

Be

There Replacement

Latino (Hispanic) English




Chicano English

Phonological Variables of ChE



Dialects 297

Syntactic Variables in ChE

SAE ChE

Genderlects

2006 Berkeley Breathed/Washington Post Writer’s Group/Cartoonist Group






Dialects 299

Women’s Word Men’s Word




Sociolinguistic Analysis




Languages in Contact

Even a dog we do know is better company than a man whose language we know not.

ST. AUGUSTINE, City of God, 5th century

Lingua Francas

Language is a steed that carries one into a far country.

ARAB PROVERB




Contact Languages: Pidgins and Creoles

The charmer’s name was Gaff. I’d seen him around. Bryant must have upped him to the

Blade Runner unit. That gibberish he talked was city speak—gutter talk—a mishmash of

Japanese, Spanish, German, what have you. I didn’t really need a translator. I knew the

lingo. Every good cop did. But I wasn’t gonna make it easier for him.

DECKARD, from the motion picture Bladerunner, 1981







Kamtok SE







Creoles and Creolization

Padi d m; k ntri; una l we de na Rom.

M k una l kak una yes. A kam b r Siza,

a n kam prez am.

WILLIAM SHAKESPEARE, Julius Caesar, translated to Krio by Thomas Decker

Creoles are particularly interesting because they represent an extreme of language

change, but it is the mechanisms of language change, which are ubiquitous in the history

of every language and every language family, that have made creoles what they are.

IAN ROBERTS, “Verb Movement and Markedness,” in Michel DeGraff, ed., Language Creation and Language Change, 1999




TABLE 7.1 | Cape Verdean Creole Pronouns

Emphatic (Strong)

Forms

Free (Weak)

Forms

Subject

Clitics

Object

Clitics

1sg ami mi N- -m

2sg (informal) abo bo bu- -bu/-u

2sg (formal, masc.) anho nho nhu-

2sg (formal, fem.) anha nha

3sg ael el e- -l

1pl anos nos nu- -nu

2pl anhos nhos

3pl aes es -s







Bilingualism

He who has two languages has two souls.

ANONYMOUS




Codeswitching

When they first met, she’d never seemed to stop talking, bubbling over, switching from

German to English as if one language couldn’t contain it, everything she had to say.

JOSEPH KANON, Istanbul Passage, 2012







Language and Education

Outside of a dog, a book is a man’s best friend; inside of a dog, it’s too dark to read.

GROUCHO MARX (1890–1977)

Second-Language Teaching Methods

He can learn a language in a fortnight. Knows dozens of them: the sure mark of a fool.

HENRY HIGGINS, From the script of the motion picture Pygmalion, 1938.




Teaching Reading

“Baby Blues” © Baby Blues Partnership. Reprinted with permission of King Features Syndicate.







Literacy in the Deaf Community




Bilingual Education

The United States of America has more monolingual experts on bilingual education than

any other country in the world.

ROBERTO BAHRUTH, Perspective on Teaching English Language Learners, 2004







Minority Dialects

Language in Use

Language is not an abstract construction of the learned, or of dictionary-makers, but is

something arising out of the work, needs, ties, joys, affections, tastes, of long generations

of humanity, and has its bases broad and low, close to the ground.

WALT WHITMAN, “Slang in America,” 1885



Language in Use 319

Styles

Slang

Slang is a language that rolls up its sleeves, spits on its hands, and goes to work.

CARL SANDBURG, quoted in “Minstrel of America: Carl Sandburg,” New York Times, February 13, 1959




Jargon and Argot

Taboo or Not Taboo?

Sex is a four-letter word.

BUMPER STICKER SLOGAN



Language in Use 321

Anglo-Saxon Taboo Words Latinate Acceptable Words




Euphemisms

Banish the use of the four-letter words

Whose meaning is never obscure.

The Anglos, the Saxons, those bawdy old birds

Were vulgar, obscene, and impure.

But cherish the use of the weaseling phrase

That never quite says what it means;

You’d better be known for your hypocrite ways

Than vulgar, impure, and obscene.

FOLK SONG ATTRIBUTED TO WARTIME ROYAL AIR FORCE OF GREAT BRITAIN



Language in Use 323

Racial and National Epithets

Language and Sexism

doctor, n. . . . a man of great learning.

THE AMERICAN COLLEGE DICTIONARY, 1947

A businessman is aggressive; a businesswoman is pushy. A businessman is good on details;

she’s picky. . . . He follows through; she doesn’t know when to quit. He stands firm; she’s

hard. . . . He isn’t afraid to say what is on his mind; she’s mouthy. He exercises authority

diligently; she’s power mad. He’s closemouthed; she’s secretive. He climbed the ladder of

success; she slept her way to the top.

FROM “HOW TO TELL A BUSINESSMAN FROM A BUSINESSWOMAN,” The Balloon, Graduate School of Management, UCLA, 1976




Marked and Unmarked Forms

If the English language had been properly organized . . . then there would be a word which

meant both “he” and “she,” and I could write, “If John or Mary comes, heesh will want to

play tennis,” which would save a lot of trouble.

A. A. MILNE, The Christopher Robin Birthday Book, 1930

Male Female



Language in Use 325

Secret Languages and Language Games




Summary



Summary 327







Exercises

Exercises 329




Tok Pisin Gloss Answer



British American

Dialect 1 Dialect 2 Dialect 3

Exercises 331






A B

A B

Exercises 333






Exercises 335






337

8Language Change: The Syllables of Time

No language as depending on arbitrary use and custom can ever be permanently the

same, but will always be in a mutable and fluctuating state; and what is deem’d polite

and elegant in one age, may be accounted uncouth and barbarous in another.

BENJAMIN MARTIN (1704–1782)



338 CHAPTER 8 Language Change: The Syllables of Time

The Regularity of Sound Change

That’s not a regular rule: you invented it just now.




The Regularity of Sound Change 339

Sound Correspondences

Ancestral Protolanguages

The living languages, as they were called by the Harvard fellows, were little more than

cheap imitations, low distortions. Italian, like Spanish and German, particularly represented

the loose political passions, bodily appetites, and absent morals of decadent Europe.

MATTHEW PEARL, The Dante Club, 2003




French /p/

Latin /p/

Indo-European /p/

Proto-Germanic /f/

Spanish /p/ . . . English /f/ German /f/ . . .

Phonological Change

Etymologists . . . for whom vowels did not matter and who cared not a jot for consonants.

VOLTAIRE (1694–1778)




Phonological Rules

It’s a good idea to obey all the rules when you’re young just so you’ll have the strength to

break them when you’re old.

MARK TWAIN (1835–1910)




The Great Vowel Shift

Shift Example

Middle Modern Middle Modern

English English English English

→ →

→ →

→ →

→ →

→ →

→ →

→ →




FIGURE 8.1 | The Great Vowel Shift.

TABLE 8.1 | Effect of Vowel Shift on Modern English

Middle English Shifted Short Word with Word with

Vowel Vowel Vowel Shifted Vowel Short Vowel

divine divinity

abound abundant

serene serenity

fool folly

sane sanity




Morphological Change

And is he well content his son should find

No nourishment to feed his growing mind,

But conjugated verbs and nouns declin’d?

WILLIAM COWPER, “Tirocinium,” 1785

Noun Noun Stem Case Ending Case Example




Case OE Singular OE Plural

Syntactic Change

Understanding changes in grammar is a key component in understanding changes in

language.

DAVID LIGHTFOOT, The Development of Language, 1999




V

NP V

VP

V NP

VP

V













Lexical Change

appletini

chocotini

crantini

flirtini

frostini

mintatini

mochatini

peachatini

peartini

VeeV treetini

A SELECTION OF MARTINI VARIANTS FROM THE MENU OF A “MARTINI BAR”

Change in Category

Darby Conley/United Feature Syndicate



Lexical Change 351

Addition of New Words

And to bring in a new word by the head and shoulders, they leave out the old one.

MONTAIGNE (1533–1592)

“Pickles” used with the permission of Brian Crane, the Washington Post Writers Group and the Cartoonist Group.

All rights reserved.

Word Coinage






Lexical Change 353

Words from Names




Blends



Lexical Change 355

Reduced Words

This perpetual Disposition to shorten our Words, by retrenching the Vowels, is nothing

else but a tendency to lapse into the Barbarity of those Northern Nations from whom we

are descended, and whose Languages labour all under the same Defect.

JONATHAN SWIFT, A Proposal for Correcting, Improving and Ascertaining the English Tongue, 1712




Borrowings or Loan Words

Neither a borrower, nor a lender be.

WILLIAM SHAKESPEARE , Hamlet, c. 1600



Lexical Change 357

History through Loan Words

A morsel of genuine history is a thing so rare as to be always valuable.

THOMAS JEFFERSON, in a letter to John Adams, 1817






Lexical Change 359

Loss of Words

RED ROVER © 2012 Brian Basset Dist. By UNIVERSAL UCLICK. Reprinted with permission. All rights reserved.




Semantic Change

The language of this country being always upon the flux, the Struldbruggs of one age do

not understand those of another, neither are they able after two hundred years to hold any

conversation (farther than by a few general words) with their neighbors the mortals, and

thus they lie under the disadvantage of living like foreigners in their own country.





Broadening

Narrowing

Meaning Shifts

Reconstructing “Dead” Languages

None of your living languages for Miss Blimber. They must be dead—stone dead—and then

Miss Blimber dug them up like a Ghoul.

CHARLES DICKENS, Dombey and Son, 1848




The Nineteenth-Century Comparativists

When agreement is found in words in two languages, and so frequently that rules may

be drawn up for the shift in letters from one to the other, then there is a fundamental

relationship between the two languages.

RASMUS RASK (1787–1832)

“Shoe,” 1989, Macnelly/King Features Syndicate




Cognates

Earlier stage:a

Later stage:

bh

b

dh

d

gh

g

b

p

d

t

g

k

p

f

t k

x (or h)

FIGURE 8.2 | Grimm’s Law, an early Germanic sound shift. Grimm’s Law can be expressed

in terms of natural classes of speech sounds: Voiced aspirates become unaspirated;

voiced stops become voiceless; voiceless stops become fricatives.aThis “earlier stage” is Indo-European. The symbols bh, dh, and gh are breathy voiced stop consonants.

These phonemes are often called “voiced aspirates.”

"Family Circus", Bil Keane Inc. Reprinted with the permission of King Features Syndicate




Indo-European

*p

Sanskrit

p

Latin

p

English

f

pitar-

pad-

No cognate

pasua

pater

ped-

piscis

pecu

father

foot

fish

fee

FIGURE 8.3 | Cognates of Indo-European *p. a is a sibilant pronounced differently from s.




Comparative Reconstruction

. . . Philologists who chase

A panting syllable through time and space

Start it at home, and hunt it in the dark,

To Gaul, to Greece, and into Noah’s Ark.

WILLIAM COWPER, “Retirement,” 1782

Indo-European

*p

*t

*k

*b

*d

*g

*bh

*dh

*gh

p

t

b

d

j

bh

dh

h

p

t

k

b

d

g

f

f

h

f

h

p

t

k

b

d

g

Sanskrit Latin English

pitar-

trayas

un

No cognate

dva-

ajras

bhr tar-

dh

vah-

pater

tr s

canis

labium

duo

ager

fr ter

f -ci

veh-

father

three

hound

lip

two

acre

brother

do

wagon

FIGURE 8.4 | Some Indo-European sound correspondences.




French Italian Spanish Portuguese English




Language A Language B Language C Language D




Standard Northern Lombard

L1 L2




Historical Evidence

You know my method. It is founded upon the observance of trifles.

SIR ARTHUR CONAN DOYLE, “The Boscombe Valley Mystery,” in The Memoirs of Sherlock Holmes, 1891







Extinct and Endangered Languages

Any language is the supreme achievement of a uniquely human collective genius, as divine

and unfathomable a mystery as a living organism.

MICHAEL KRAUSS, in a speech to the Linguistic Society of America, 1991

I am always sorry when any language is lost, because languages are the pedigree of

nations.











The Genetic Classification of Languages

The Sanskrit language, whatever be its antiquity, is of a wonderful structure, more perfect

than the Greek, more copious than the Latin, and more exquisitely refined than either, yet

bearing to both of them a stronger affinity, both in the roots of verbs and in the forms of

grammar, than could possibly have been produced by accident; so strong, indeed, that no

philologer could examine all three, without believing that they have sprung from some

common source, which, perhaps, no longer exists. . . .

SIR WILLIAM JONES (1746–1794)

English German Vietnamese




Languages of the World

And the whole earth was of one language, and of one speech.

GENESIS 11:1, The Bible, King James Version

Let us go down, and there confound their language, that they may not understand one

another’s speech.

GENESIS 11:7, The Bible, King James Version




Bengali

INDO-E

UROPEAN

IND

O-I

RA

NIA

NG

ER

MA

NIC

SL

AV

IC

BA

LT

ICH

EL

LE

NIC

Gre

ek

Anci

ent

Gre

ek

ITA

LIC

CE

LT

IC

RO

MA

NC

E

(Lat

in)

Nort

hW

est

San

skri

t

Old

Per

sian

Arm

enia

n

Alb

ania

n

Hindi

Latvian

Danish

Afrikaans

Catalan

French

Italian

Portuguese

Provençal

Romanian

Spanish

Dutch

English

Yiddish

Frisian

German

Icelandic

Norwegian

Swedish

Breton

Irish

Scots Gaelic

Welsh

Bulgarian

Czech

Macedonian

Polish

Russian

Serbo-Croatian

Slovak

Slovenian

Ukranian

Lithuanian

PunjabiPersian (Farsi)

Kurdish

Pashto

Urdu

FIGURE 8.5 | The Indo-European family of languages.







Types of Languages

All the Oriental nations jam tongue and words together in the throat, like the Hebrews

and Syrians. All the Mediterranean peoples push their enunciation forward to the palate,

like the Greeks and the Asians. All the Occidentals break their words on the teeth, like the

Italians and Spaniards. . . .

ISIDORE OF SEVILLE , 7th century CE



Types of Languages 379







Why Do Languages Change?

Some method should be thought on for ascertaining and fixing our language forever. . . .

I see no absolute necessity why any language should be perpetually changing.

JONATHAN SWIFT (1667–1745)

Stability in language is synonymous with rigor mortis.

ERNEST WEEKLEY (1865–1954)




Old English (c = [k ]) Modern English (ch = [ ])







Summary








Exercises

→

OE Mod E

→

→

→

→

→

→

[i]/[ ] [a ]/[ ] [e]/[æ]



Exercises 387




Latin French Gloss

True False



Exercises 389

L1 L2 L3 L4 L5 L6

L7 L8 L9 L10 L11 L12




Dialect 1 Dialect 2 Gloss Earlier Form

(to be completed)

Maori Hawaiian Samoan Fijian Gloss Proto-Polynesian

(to be completed)



Exercises 391

→

Yerington Northfork

Paviotso = YP Monachi = NM Gloss




Big-End Little-End Gloss Proto-Egglish

Egglish Egglish (to be completed)

Greek Latin



Exercises 393

A B C



394

Language Acquisition

9

The Linguistic Capacity of Children

We are designed to walk. . . . That we are taught to walk is impossible. And pretty much the

same is true of language. Nobody is taught language. In fact you can’t prevent the child

from learning it.

NOAM CHOMSKY, The Human Language Series program 2, 1994

The capacity to learn language is deeply ingrained in us as a species, just as the capacity

to walk, to grasp objects, to recognize faces. We don’t find any serious differences

in children growing up in congested urban slums, in isolated mountain villages, or in

privileged suburban villas.

DAN SLOBIN, The Human Language Series program 2, 1994




What’s Learned, What’s Not?

ScienceCartoonsPlus.com



396 CHAPTER 9 Language Acquisition







Stages in Language Acquisition

. . . for I was no longer a speechless infant; but a speaking boy. This I remember; and have

since observed how I learned to speak. It was not that my elders taught me words . . . in

any set method; but I . . . did myself . . . practice the sounds in my memory. . . . And thus

by constantly hearing words, as they occurred in various sentences . . . I thereby gave

utterance to my will.

ST. AUGUSTINE, Confessions, 398 CE

The Perception and Production of Speech Sounds

An infant crying in the night:

An infant crying for the light:

And with no language but a cry.

ALFRED LORD TENNYSON, In Memoriam A.H.H., 1849







Babbling

“Hi & Lois”/King Features Syndicate




First WordsFrom this golden egg a man, Prajapati, was born. . . . A year having passed, he wanted to

speak. He said “bhur” and the earth was created. He said “bhuvar” and the space of the air

was created. He said “suvar” and the sky was created. That is why a child wants to speak

after a year. . . . When Prajapati spoke for the first time, he uttered one or two syllables.

That is why a child utters one or two syllables when he speaks for the first time.

HINDU MYTH




Segmenting the Speech StreamI scream, you scream, we all scream for ice cream.

TRANSCRIBED FROM VOCALS BY TOM STACKS, performing with Harry Reser’s Six Jumping Jacks, January 14, 1928







The Acquisition of Phonology

“Baby Blues”, Baby Blues Partnership. Reprinted with permission of King Features Syndicate







The Acquisition of Word Meaning

Suddenly I felt a misty consciousness as of something forgotten—a thrill of returning

thought; and somehow the mystery of language was revealed to me. . . . Everything had a

name, and each name gave birth to a new thought.

HELEN KELLER, The Story of My Life, 1903







The Acquisition of Morphology





Stage 1 Stage 2 Stage 3




Child Utterance Adult Translation




The Acquisition of Syntax

“Doonesbury” 1984 G.B. Trudeau. Reprinted with permission of Universal Press Syndicate







S

NP

Pronoun

he

V

VP

play

Adj

NP

little

N

tune

S

NP

N

Andrew

V

VP

want

Pronoun

NP

that

S

NP

N

Cathy

V

VP

build

N

NP

house







The Acquisition of Pragmatics





The Development of Auxiliaries: A Case Study




Dutch




Italian




French

German

Setting Parameters




The Acquisition of Signed Languages







The Role of the Linguistic Environment: Adult Input

[The acquisition of language] is doubtless the greatest intellectual feat any one of us is

ever required to perform.

LEONARD BLOOMFIELD, Language, 1933

The Role of Imitation, Reinforcement, and Analogy

ANONYMOUS ADULT AND CHILD



The Role of the Linguistic Environment: Adult Input 423

Adult Child

Child Mother




The Role of Structured Input




Knowing More Than One Language

He that understands grammar in one language, understands it in another as far as

the essential properties of Grammar are concerned. The fact that he can’t speak, nor

comprehend, another language is due to the diversity of words and their various forms,

but these are the accidental properties of grammar.

ROGER BACON (1214–1294)




Childhood Bilingualism

2009 Tundra Comics




Theories of Bilingual DevelopmentThere is not reason to believe that the underlying principles and mechanisms of language

education [in bilinguals] are qualitatively differed from those used by monolinguals.

JÜRGEN MEISEL, Linguistics 24, 1986




Two Monolinguals in One Head




The Role of Input

Cognitive Effects of BilingualismBilingual Hebrew-English-speaking child: “I speak Hebrew and English.”

Monolingual English-speaking child: “What’s English?”

SOURCE UNKNOWN




Second Language Acquisition

Is L2 Acquisition the Same as L1 Acquisition?







Native Language Influence in L2 Acquisition




The Creative Component of L2 Acquisition




Heritage Language Learners

Is There a Critical Period for L2 Acquisition? I don’t know how you manage, Sir, amongst all the foreigners; you never know what they

are saying. When the poor things first come here they gabble away like geese, although

the children can soon speak well enough.

MARGARET ATWOOD, Alias Grace, 1996







Summary



Summary 437





Exercises



Exercises 439






L1 = Egyptian Arabic L1 = Iraqi Arabic

Arabic A Arabic B

Exercises 441






Child’s utterance Gloss Translation

A B

Exercises 443



444

Language Processing and the Human Brain

10

The Human Mind at Work

No doubt a reasonable model of language use will incorporate, as a basic component, the

generative grammar that expresses the speaker-hearer’s knowledge of the language; but

this generative grammar does not, in itself, prescribe the character or functioning of a

perceptual model or a model of speech production.

NOAM CHOMSKY, Aspects of the Theory of Syntax, 1965




Comprehension

“I quite agree with you,” said the Duchess; “and the moral of that is—‘Be what you would

seem to be’—or, if you’d like it put more simply—‘Never imagine yourself not to be

otherwise than what it might appear to others . . . to be otherwise.’”

“I think I should understand that better,” Alice said very politely, “if I had it written down:

but I can’t quite follow it as you say it.”




446 CHAPTER 10 Language Processing and the Human Brain

The Speech Signal




Speech PerceptionThe mice think they are right, but my cat eats them anyways (sic) . . . perception is

everything.

TERRY GOODKIND (B. 1948)

FIGURE 10.1 | A spectrogram of the words heed, head, had, and who’d, spoken with a

British accent (speaker: Peter Ladefoged, February 16, 1973).

From LADEFOGED/JOHNSON. A Course in Phonetics (with CD-ROM), 6E. © 2011 Cengage Learning.

Reproduced by permission.







Bottom-Up and Top-Down ModelsI have experimented and experimented until now I know that [water] never does run

uphill, except in the dark. I know it does in the dark, because the pool never goes dry;

which it would, of course, if the water didn’t come back in the night. It is best to prove

things by experiment; then you know; whereas if you depend on guessing and supposing

and conjecturing, you will never get educated.

MARK TWAIN, Eve’s Diary, 1906







Lexical Access and Word RecognitionOh, are you from Wales?

Do you know a fella named Jonah?

He used to live in whales for a while.

GROUCHO MARX (1890–1977)







Syntactic ProcessingTeacher Strikes Idle Kids

Enraged Cow Injures Farmer with Ax

Killer Sentenced to Die for Second Time in 10 Years

Stolen Painting Found by Tree

AMBIGUOUS HEADLINES










Speech Production

Speech was given to the ordinary sort of men, whereby to communicate their mind; but to

wise men, whereby to conceal it.

ROBERT SOUTH, sermon at Westminster Abbey, April 30, 1676

Lexical SelectionHumpty Dumpty’s theory, of two meanings packed into one word like a portmanteau,

seems to me the right explanation for all. For instance, take the two words “fuming” and

“furious.” Make up your mind that you will say both words but leave it unsettled which

you will say first. Now open your mouth and speak. If . . . you have that rarest of gifts, a

perfectly balanced mind, you will say “frumious.”

LEWIS CARROLL, Preface to The Hunting of the Snark, 1876




→

→

→

→

→

→

→

→

→

→

→

→




Application and Misapplication of RulesI thought . . . four rules would be enough, provided that I made a firm and constant

resolution not to fail even once in the observance of them.

RENÉ DESCARTES, Discourse on Method, 1637

Planning Units

“U.S. Acres,” Paws, Inc. All Rights Reserved




→

→

→

→

→

→







Brain and Language

The human brain is a most unusual instrument of elegant and as yet unknown capacity.

STUART SEATON

The Human Brain

The human brain is unique in that it is the only container of which it can be said that the

more you put into it, the more it will hold.

GLENN DOMAN




The Localization of Language in the Brain

Front

Back

Cortex WhiteMatter

Corpus Callosum

RightHemisphere

LeftHemisphere

FIGURE 10.2 | Three-dimensional reconstruction of the normal living human brain. The

images were obtained from magnetic resonance data using the Brainvox technique. Left

panel = view from top. Right panel = view from the front following virtual coronal section

at the level of the dashed line.

Courtesy of Hanna Damásio.

“Peanuts,” United Feature Syndicate, Inc




Aphasia

FIGURE 10.3 | Phrenology skull model.




The Linguistic Characterization of Aphasic Syndromes

FIGURE 10.4 | Lateral (external) view of the left hemisphere of the human brain, showing

the position of Broca’s and Wernicke’s areas—two key areas of the cortex related to

language processing.







Stimulus Response 1 Response 2

Stimulus Response Stimulus Response







Brain Imaging in Aphasic Patients




FIGURE 10.5 | Three-dimensional reconstruction of the brain of a living patient with

Broca’s aphasia. Note area of damage in left frontal region (dark gray), which was caused

by a stroke.


FIGURE 10.6 | Three-dimensional reconstruction of the brain of a living patient with

Wernicke’s aphasia. Note area of damage in left posterior temporal and lower parietal

region (dark gray), which was caused by a stroke.





Split Brains It takes only one hemisphere to have a mind.

A. L. WIGAN, The Duality of the Mind, 1844




Dichotic Listening

Event-Related Potentials




Neural Evidence of Grammatical Phenomena

Neurolinguistic Studies of Speech Sounds




Neurolinguistic Studies of Sentence Structure




Language and Brain Development

If the brain were so simple we could understand it, we would be so simple we couldn’t.

LYALL WATSON




Left Hemisphere Lateralization for Language in Young Children

“Jump Start” copyright United Feature Syndicate




Brain Plasticity

The Critical Period









The Modular Mind: Dissociations of Language and Cognition 479

The Modular Mind: Dissociations of Language and Cognition

[T]he human mind is not an unstructured entity but consists of components which can be

distinguished by their functional properties.

NEIL SMITH AND IANTHI-MARIA TSIMPLI, The Mind of a Savant: Language, Learning, and Modularity, 1995

Linguistic Savants






The Modular Mind: Dissociations of Language and Cognition 481

Specific Language Impairment




Genetic Basis of Language

Summary



Summary 483






Summary 485







Exercises

→

→

→

→

Exercises 487




→

→

→

→

→

→

→

→

→

→

→

→

→

→

→

→



Exercises 489






Exercises 491






Exercises 493






495

Man is still the most extraordinary computer of all.

Computers That Talk and Listen

The first generations of computers had received their inputs through glorified typewriter

keyboards, and had replied through high-speed printers and visual displays. HAL could do

this when necessary, but most of his communication with his shipmates was by means of

the spoken words. Poole and Bowman could talk to HAL as if he were a human being, and

he would reply in the perfect idiomatic English he had learned during the fleeting weeks of

his electronic childhood.

ARTHUR C. CLARKE, 2001: A Space Odyssey, 1968

11Computer Processing of Human Language

JOHN F. KENNEDY (1917–1963)



496 CHAPTER 11 Computer Processing of Human Language

Computational Phonetics and Phonology

Speech Recognition

When Frederic was a little lad he proved so brave and daring,

His father thought he’d ’prentice him to some career seafaring.

I was, alas! his nurs’rymaid, and so it fell to my lot

To take and bind the promising boy apprentice to a pilot—

A life not bad for a hardy lad, though surely not a high lot,

Though I’m a nurse, you might do worse than make your boy a pilot.

I was a stupid nurs’rymaid, on breakers always steering,

And I did not catch the word aright, through being hard of hearing;




Mistaking my instructions, which within my brain did gyrate

I took and bound this promising boy apprentice to a pirate.

GILBERT AND SULLIVAN, The Pirates of Penzance, 1879




Speech Synthesis

Machines which, with more or less success, imitate human speech, are the most difficult to

construct, so many are the agencies engaged in uttering even a single word—so many are the

inflections and variations of tone and articulation, that the mechanician finds his ingenuity

taxed to the utmost to imitate them.

SCIENTIFIC AMERICAN, January 14, 1871







Text-to-SpeechSpeak clearly, if you speak at all; carve every word before you let it fall.

OLIVER WENDELL HOLMES, SR. (1809–1894)







Computational Morphology




Computational Syntax

Good order is the foundation of all things.

EDMUND BURKE, Reflections on the Revolution in France, 1790







Simple Adjectives Hyphenated Adjectives Nouns

Computational Semantics

“Zits”, 2001 Zits Partnership. Reprinted with permission of King Features Syndicate







Computational Pragmatics

AGENTYou put up

theswitch

THEME

FIGURE 11.1 | Semantic network for You put up the switch.





Computational Sign Language




Applications of Computational Linguistics

Computer Models of Grammar

I am never content until I have constructed a . . . model of the subject I am studying. If I

succeed in making one, I understand; otherwise I do not.

WILLIAM THOMSON (LORD KELVIN), Molecular Dynamics and the Wave Theory of Light, 1904

A theory has only the alternative of being right or wrong. A model has a third possibility: it

may be right, but irrelevant.

MANFRED EIGEN, The Physicist’s Conception of Nature, 1973




Frequency Analysis, Concordances, and Collocations

[The professor had written] all the words of their language in their several moods, tenses

and declensions [on tiny blocks of wood, and had] emptied the whole vocabulary into his

frame, and made the strictest computation of the general proportion there is in books

between the numbers of particles, nouns, and verbs, and other parts of speech.





Computational Lexicography

Dictionary, n. A malevolent literary device for cramping the growth of a language and

making it hard and inelastic.

AMBROSE BIERCE, The Devil’s Dictionary, 1911




The Culturomic Revolution

You Ain’t Seen Nothin’ Yet

RANDY BACHMAN (Title of a rock song, 1974)




Twitterology

Our expressiveness and our ease with some words is being diluted so that the sentence

with more than one clause is a problem for us, and the word of more than two syllables is a

problem for us . . .

RALPH FIENNES (British actor)




Information Retrieval and Summarization

Hired

Tired

Fired

A CAREER SUMMARY, source obscure




Spell Checkers

Take care that you never spell a word wrong . . . It produces great praise to a lady to spell

well.

THOMAS JEFFERSON, in a letter to his daughter Martha, 1783




Machine Translation

When I look at any article in Russian, I say: “This is really written in English, but it has been

coded in some strange symbols. I will now proceed to decode it.”

WARREN WEAVER, in Machine Translation of Languages, Locke, W. N., and A. D. Boothe (eds.). 1955.







Computational Forensic Linguistics

Trademarks

There is a risk that the word “Google” could become so commonly used that it becomes

synonymous with the word “search.” If this happens, we could lose protection for this

trademark, which could result in other people using the word “Google” to refer to their

own products, thus diminishing our brand.

QUOTED IN THE GUARDIAN WEEKLY, July 21, 2006

SpeechSource

SpeechRecognitionSystem

TextSource

Translationby

Computer

TextTarget

SpeechSynthesisSystem

SpeechTarget

FIGURE 11.2 | Logic flow of machine translation of speech.




Interpreting Legal Terms

A Daniel come to judgment! yea, a Daniel!

WILLIAM SHAKESPEARE, The Merchant of Venice, Act IV, Scene 1, c. 1596

Speaker Identification

Good morning. There are three bombs to go off today at three pharmaceuticals in North

Carolina. Please be aware. Advise your people or go to their funerals. Goodbye.

TRANSCRIPT OF A VOICE MAIL MESSAGE TO A PHARMACEUTICAL DISTRIBUTION COMPANY IN RALEIGH, NORTH CAROLINA




FIGURE 11.3 | Waveforms showing the word goodbye spoken by a bomb-threat caller

(left) and the suspect arrested for that incident (right).

Adobe product screen shot reprinted with permission from Adobe Systems Incorporated



Summary 521

Summary

FIGURE 11.4 | Top: waveforms of the word goodbye. Bottom: spectrogram of the same

utterance.

Adobe product screen shot reprinted with permission from Adobe Systems Incorporated






Exercises 523


Exercises






Exercises 525






527

The Moving Finger writes; and, having writ,

Moves on: nor all thy Piety nor Wit

Shall lure it back to cancel half a Line,

Nor all thy Tears wash out a Word of it.

The palest ink is better than the sharpest memory.

12Writing: The ABCs of Language

OMAR KHAYYÁM, Rubáiyát, c. 1080 (trans. Edward FitzGerald, 1859)

CHINESE PROVERB



528 CHAPTER 12 Writing: The ABCs of Language

The History of Writing

An Egyptian legend relates that when the god Thoth revealed his discovery of the art of

writing to King Thamos, the good King denounced it as an enemy of civilization. “Children

and young people,” protested the monarch, “who had hitherto been forced to apply

themselves diligently to learn and retain whatever was taught them, would cease to apply

themselves, and would neglect to exercise their memories.”

WILL DURANT, The Story of Civilization, vol. 1, 1935

Pictograms and Ideograms

One picture is worth a thousand words.

CHINESE PROVERB




☺

Cuneiform Writing

Bridegroom, let me caress you,

My precious caress is more savory than honey,

In the bed chamber, honey-filled,

Let me enjoy your goodly beauty,

Lion let me caress you

TRANSLATION OF A SUMERIAN POEM WRITTEN IN CUNEIFORM

FIGURE 12.1 | Six of seventy-seven symbols developed by the National Park Service for use as

signs indicating activities and facilities in parks and recreation areas. These symbols denote,

from left to right: ‘environmental study area,’ ‘grocery store,’ ‘men’s restroom,’ ‘women’s

restroom,’ ‘fishing,’ and ‘amphitheater.’ Certain symbols are available with a prohibiting

slash—a diagonal red bar across the symbol that means that the activity is forbidden.

National Park Service, U.S. Department of the Interior







The Rebus Principle

WILLIAM SHAKESPEARE, Hamlet, c. 1600

two bee, oar knot two bee




From Hieroglyphics to the Alphabet

Eric Lewis/The New Yorker Collection/www.cartoonbank.com




Modern Writing Systems

. . . but their manner of writing is very peculiar, being neither from the left to the right, like

the Europeans; nor from the right to the left, like the Arabians; nor from up to down, like

the Chinese; nor from down to up, like the Cascagians, but aslant from one corner of the

paper to the other, like ladies in England.





Word Writing

People separated by a blade of grass cannot understand each other.

CHINESE PROVERB




Syllabic Writing




Consonantal Alphabet Writing

“DILBERT” © 2010 Scott Adams. Used by permission of UNIVERSAL UCLICK. All

rights reserved.




Alphabetic Writing







FIGURE 12.2 | Timeline of the development of the Roman alphabet.

Writing and Speech

Algernon: But, my own sweet Cecily, I have never written you any letters.

Cecily: You need hardly remind me of that, Ernest. I remember only too well that I was forced

to write your letters for you. I wrote always three times a week, and sometimes oftener.

Algernon: Oh, do let me read them, Cecily?

Cecily: Oh, I couldn’t possibly. They would make you far too conceited. The three you

wrote me after I had broken off the engagement are so beautiful, and so badly spelled,

that even now I can hardly read them without crying a little.

OSCAR WILDE, The Importance of Being Earnest, 1895







“Garfield” 1993 Paws, Inc. Universal Uclick




Spelling

“Do you spell it with a ‘v’ or a ‘w’?” inquired the judge.

“That depends upon the taste and fancy of the speller, my Lord,” replied Sam.

CHARLES DICKENS, The Pickwick Papers, 1837

Same Sound Different Sound Silent Letters Missing Letters

Different Spelling Same Spelling




Middle English Spelling Reformed Spelling

→

→

→

→




Texting

“Blondie” © 2009 King Features Syndicate

The Current English Spelling System

When our spelling is perfect, it’s invisible. But when it’s flawed, it prompts strong negative

associations.

MARILYN VOS SAVANT




a / i/ e/æ




Spelling Pronunciations

For pronunciation, the best general rule is to consider those as the most elegant speakers

who deviate least from written words.


Write with the learned, pronounce with the vulgar.

BENJAMIN FRANKLIN, Poor Richard’s Almanack, mid-eighteenth century



Pseudo-writing 547

Pseudo-writing




Summary

Serafini L. 2006. The Codex Seraphinianus. Milano: Rizzoli, 2006, 384 pp.,

ISBN 88-17-01389-7.








Exercises



Exercises 551

A B Reason

A B Reason






Exercises 553






555

Glossary

AAE

AAVE

abbreviation

abjad

accent

accidental gap

acoustic

acoustic phonetics

acoustic signal

acquired dyslexia

acronym

active sentence

adjective (Adj)

adjective phrase (AP)

adverb (Adv)

affix

affricate

African American (Vernacular) English (AA(V)E)

agent

agglutinative language

agrammatic aphasics



556 GLOSSARY

agrammatism (agrammatic)

agreement

allomorph

[- z] forms of the plural morpheme in cats, dogs, and kisses.

allophone

alphabetic abbreviation

alphabetic writing

alveolar

alveolar ridge

ambiguous, ambiguity

American Sign Language (ASL)

analogic change

analogy

analytic

analytic language

anomalous

anomaly

anomia

antecedent

anterior

antonymic pair

antonyms

aphasia

approximants



GLOSSARY 557

arbitrary

arc

argot

arguments

argument structure

article (Art)

articulatory phonetics

asemic

aspirated

assimilation rules/assimilation

asterisk

auditory phonetics

autoantonym

automatic machine translation

Aux

auxiliary verb

babbling

baby talk

back-formation

backtracking

base

bidialectal



558 GLOSSARY

bilabial

bilingualism

bilingual language acquisition

bilingual maintenance (BM)

birdcall

bird song

blend

blocked

borrowing

bottom-up processing

bound morpheme

broadening

Broca, Paul

Broca’s aphasia

Broca’s area

calligraphy

case

case endings

case morphology

case theory

cause/causative

cerebral hemispheres

characters (Chinese)

Chicano English (ChE)



GLOSSARY 559

child-directed speech (CDS)

circumfix

classifier

click

clipping

closed class

coarticulation

cocktail party effect

coda

codeswitching

cognates

coinage

collocation analysis

comparative linguistics

comparative method

comparative reconstruction

competence, linguistic

complement

complementary distribution

complementary pair

complementizer (C)



560 GLOSSARY

complementizer phrase (CP)

compositional semantics

compound

computational forensic linguistics

computational lexicography

computational linguistics

computational morphology

computational phonetics and phonology

computational pragmatics

computational semantics

computational syntax

concatenative (speech) synthesis

concordance

conditioned sound change

connectionism

connotative meaning/connotation

consonant

consonantal

consonantal alphabet



GLOSSARY 561

consonantal writing

constituent

constituent structure

constituent structure tree

content words

context

continuant

contour tones

contradiction

contradictory

contralateral

contrast

contrasting tones

contrastive stress

convention, conventional

cooperative principle

coordinate structure

coreference

coreferential

coronals

corpus

corpus callosum

cortex

count nouns

cover symbol



562 GLOSSARY

creativity of language, creative aspect of linguistic knowledge

creole

creolization

critical-age hypothesis

critical period

C-selection

culturomics

cuneiform

data mining

declarative (sentence)

declension

deep structure

definite

deictic/deixis

demonstrative articles, demonstratives

denotative meaning

dental

derivation

derivational affix

derivational morpheme

derived structure

derived word



GLOSSARY 563

descriptive grammar

determiner (Det)

diacritics, diacritic marks

dialect

dialect area

dialect atlas

dialect continuum

dialect leveling

dialect map

dichotic listening

digraph

diphthong

direct object

discontinuous morpheme

discourse

discourse analysis

discreteness

dissimilation rules

distinctive

distinctive features

ditransitive verb



564 GLOSSARY

dominate

downdrift

d-structure

Dual Language Immersion

dyslexia

ear witnessing

Early Middle English Vowel Shortening

ease of articulation

Ebonics

embedded sentence

emoticon

entail

entailment

epenthesis

eponym

etymology

euphemism

euphemism treadmill

event/eventive

event-related brain potentials (ERP)

experiencer

extension

false writing



GLOSSARY 565

feature-changing rules

feature matrix

feature-spreading rules

finger spelling

flap

fMRI

folk etymology

forensic linguistics

form

formant

formant (speech) synthesis

fossilization

free morpheme

free pronoun

free variation

frequency effect

fricative

front vowels

function word

functional category

fundamental difference hypothesis

fundamental frequency

fusional languages



566 GLOSSARY

gapping

garden path sentences

geminate

generate

generative grammar

generic term

genetically related

glide

gloss

glottal/glottal stop

glottis

goal

gradable pair

grammar

grammar translation

grammatical, grammaticality

grammatical case

grammatical categories

grammatical morpheme

grammatical relation

graphemes

Great Vowel Shift



GLOSSARY 567

Grimm’s Law

Hangul

head (of a compound)

head (of a phrase)

hemiplegic

hemispherectomy

heritage language

heteronyms

hierarchical structure

hieroglyphics

hiragana

historical and comparative linguistics

historical linguistics

holophrastic

homographs

homonyms/homophones

homorganic consonants

homorganic nasal rule

hypercorrection

hyponyms

iambic

iconic, iconicity



568 GLOSSARY

ideogram, ideograph

idiolect

idiom/idiomatic phrase

ill-formed

illocutionary force

imitation

immediately dominate

implicature

impoverished data

individual bilingualism

Indo-European

infinitive

infinitive sentence

infix

INFL

inflectional affix

inflectional morpheme

information retrieval

innateness hypothesis

instrument

intension

intensity

interdental

interlanguage grammars

internal borrowing



GLOSSARY 569

internal reconstruction

International Phonetic Alphabet (IPA)

International Phonetic Association (IPA)

interrogative (sentence)

intonation

intransitive verb

IP

ipsilateral

isogloss

isolating language

jargon

kana

kanji

katakana

L2 acquisition

labial

labiodental

labio-velar

language attrition

language contact

language isolate

larynx

late closure principle

lateral

lateralization, lateralized

lax vowel



570 GLOSSARY

length

level tones

lexical access

lexical ambiguity

lexical category

lexical decision

lexical gap

lexical paraphrases

lexical semantics

lexicographer

lexicography

lexicon

lexifier language

lingua franca

linguistic competence

linguistic context

linguistic determinism

linguistic performance

linguistic relativism

linguistic sign

linguistic theory

liquids

loan translations

loan word



GLOSSARY 571

localization

location

logograms

logographic writing

machine translation

magnetic resonance imaging (MRI)

magnetoencephalogram (MEG)

main verb

manner of articulation

marked

mass nouns

maxim of manner

maxim of quality

maxim of quantity

maxim of relevance

maxims of conversation

mean length of utterances (MLU)

meaning

mental grammar

metalinguistic awareness

metaphor

metathesis



572 GLOSSARY

metonym, metonymy

mimetic

minimal attachment principle

minimal pair (or set)

modal

modularity (modular)

monogenetic theory of language origin

monomorphemic word

monophthong

monosyllabic

morpheme

morphological parser

morphological rules

morphology

morphophonemic orthography

morphophonemic rules

motherese

Move

naming task

narrowing

nasal (nasalized) sound

nasal cavity

natural class

negative polarity item (NPI)

Neo-Grammarians



GLOSSARY 573

Neo-Grammarian hypothesis

neurolinguistics

neutralization

node

noncontinuant

nondistinctive features

nonphonemic features

nonredundant

nonsense word

Nostratic

noun (N)

noun phrase (NP)

nucleus

obstruents

onomatopoeia/onomatopoeic

onset

open

Optimality Theory

oral cavity

oral sound

orthography

overextension

overgeneralization

palatal

palate



574 GLOSSARY

paradigm

paradox

parallel processing

parameters

paraphrases

parsing

parser

participle

passive sentence

performance, linguistic

performative sentence

performative verb

person deixis

petroglyph

pharynx

phone

phoneme

phonemic features

phonemic principle

phonemic representation

phonetic alphabet



GLOSSARY 575

phonetic features

phonetic representation

phonetic similarity

phonetics

phonetic transcription

phonographic symbol

phonological rules

phonology

phonotactics/phonotactic constraints

phrasal category

phrasal semantics

phrase structure rules

phrase structure tree

phrenology

pictogram

pictographic writing

pidgin

pidginization

Pinyin

pitch

pitch contour

place deixis

place of articulation



576 GLOSSARY

plosives

polyglot

polymorphemic word

polysemous/polysemy

polysynthetic language

positron emission tomography (PET)

possessor

possible word

poverty of the stimulus

pragmatics

predicate

predictable feature

prefix

preposition (P)

prepositional object

prepositional phrase (PP)

prescriptive grammar

prestige dialect

presupposition

primes

priming

principle of compositionality

productive



GLOSSARY 577

pro-form

proper name

prosodic bootstrapping

prosodic feature

Proto-Germanic

Proto-Indo-European (PIE)

protolanguage

pseudo-writing (systems)

psycholinguistics

rebus principle

recast

recursive rule

reduced vowel

redundant

reduplication

reference

reference resolution

referent

reflexive pronoun

regional dialect



578 GLOSSARY

register

register tones

regular sound correspondence

relational opposites

retroflex sound

rime

root

rounded vowel

rules of syntax

SAE

Sapir-Whorf hypothesis

savant

second language acquisition

segment

semantic bootstrapping

semantic features

semantic network

semantic priming

semantic properties

semantic representation

semantic rules

semantics



GLOSSARY 579

sense

sentence (S)

sentential semantics

Separate Systems Hypothesis

sequential bilingualism

shadowing task

short message service

sibilants

sign

sign languages

simultaneous bilingualism

sisters

situational context

slang

slip of the tongue

social dialect

societal bilingualism

sociolinguistic variable

sonorants

sound change

sound shift

sound symbolism



580 GLOSSARY

source

source language

speaker dependent speech recognition

speaker identification

specific language impairment (SLI)

specifier

spectrogram

speech act

speech error

speech recognition

speech synthesis

speech understanding

spelling pronunciation

spelling reform

spell-out rules

split brain

spoonerism

S-selection

s-structure

standard

Standard American English (SAE)



GLOSSARY 581

state/stative

stem

stemming

stops

stress, stressed syllable

stress-timed language

structural ambiguity

structure dependent (1)

style

subcategorization

subject

subject-verb agreement

substrate languages

suffix

summarization

superstrate language

suppletive forms

suprasegmentals Prosodic features:

surface structure

syllabary

syllabic

syllabic writing

syllable



582 GLOSSARY

syllable-timed language

synonyms

synonymy (synonymous)

syntactic bootstrapping

syntactic category/class

syntax

synthetic language

T (tense)

taboo

tap

target language

tautology

teaching grammar

telegraphic speech

telegraphic stage

tense

text-to-speech

thematic role

theme

theta assignment

time deixis

tip of the tongue phenomenon



GLOSSARY 583

tone

tone language

top-down processing

topicalization

TP (tense phrase)

transcription, phonemic

transcription, phonetic

transfer of grammatical rules

transformational rule, transformation

transformationally induced ambiguity

transition network

transitional bilingual education (TBE)

transitive verb

tree diagram

trill

trochaic



584 GLOSSARY

truth conditions

truth-conditional semantics

truth value

twitterology

umlaut

unaspirated

unconditioned sound change

underextension

ungrammatical

uninterpretable

Unitary System Hypothesis

Universal Grammar (UG)

unmarked

uvula

uvular

velar

velum

verb (V)

verb phrase (VP)

verbal particle

Verner’s law

vocal tract



GLOSSARY 585

vocalic

voiced sound

voiceless sound

voiceprint

vowel

well-formed

Wernicke, Carl

Wernicke’s aphasia

Wernicke’s area

questions

word frames

word writing

X-bar theory

yes-no question





587

Index



588 INDEX



INDEX 589



590 INDEX



INDEX 591



592 INDEX



INDEX 593



594 INDEX



INDEX 595



596 INDEX



INDEX 597



598 INDEX



INDEX 599



600 INDEX



INDEX 601



602 INDEX



INDEX 603



604 INDEX



NASAL CAVITY

PH

AR

YN

X

TONGUE

alveolar ridgeteeth

lip

palate

velum(soft palate)

uvula

8 glottis

lip

1 2 34

56

7

ORAL


Stop (oral)

voiceless

voiced

Nasal (voiced)

Fricative

voiceless

voiced

Affricate

voiceless

voiced

Glide

voiceless

voiced

Liquid (voiced)

(central)

(lateral)

The Vocal Tract. Places of articulation: 1. bilabial; 2. labiodental; 3. interdental; 4. alveolar;

5. (alveo)palatal; 6. velar; 7. uvular; 8. glottal.

Some Phonetic Symbols for American English Consonants



Documents

[Fromkin v., Rodman R., Hyams N.] an Introduction